Stories
From Gail Merrifield Papp’s forthcoming memoir
The Belasco Project
(excerpted from the chapter “The Belasco Project”)


“First of all, I thought the speech was so artificial. Everything seemed affected and sort of pompous to me. Sir John was young and handsome, a beautiful figure on the stage and some of the words affected me, but mostly I thought ‘Why does he have to speak in that fancy way?’ I had already studied Julius Caesar in school and I knew you could say the lines in an American way, even in a Brooklyn way, and still understand them if the passion was there.
Forty-eight years later in 1986, Joe put together a repertory company of actors, mostly young, who were Black, Hispanic, Asian and white to perform Shakspeare for high school students.

“The Black, Hispanic or Asian child begins to understand that his own culture is not something to be concealed or wiped out,” Joe said, “but, on the contrary, it is part of world culture and, as such, is to be nurtured and valued.”
Excerpted from a chapter in Gail Papp’s forthcoming memoir
(excerpted from the chapter “The Belasco Project”)
Joe also told McKellen about his own teenage experience of seeing Hamlet for the first time. “In 1938, when I was in high school they invited a bunch of us kids to go to Broadway and to see Gielgud in one—and in the other was Leslie Howard. And you know we all had taste of some kind. You always have it on the street. You know a good dancer. You know a good piece of music. You know a good baseball player. So you have taste in this area as well.


Courtesy of the Papp Estate.

Excerpted from a chapter in Gail Papp’s forthcoming memoir