Month: February 2018

Calendar: February 11

Year: Day to Day Men: February 11

The City’s Pier

The eleventh of February in 1938 marks the first televised broadcast of a science fiction program. The British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC, adapted Karel Čapek’s seminal play, “R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots)” into a thirty-five minute production which aired at 3:30 in the afternoon. 

Born in January of 1890, Karel Čapek was a Czech writer, playwright and journalist. He became best known for his science fiction works, most notably the 1936 “War with the Newts”, a satirical work of exploitation and human flaws, and his “R.U.R.”, a three-act play with prologue that introduced the word robot to the English language. Although nominated seven times for the Nobel Prize in Literature, Čapek never received the award. Several awards, however, commemorate his name among which is the Karel Čapek Prize that is awarded to those who contribute to the reinforcement and maintenance of democratic and humanist values in society. 

The robots in Čapek’s 1920 “R.U.R.” are not robots in the popularly understood sense of an automaton or a mechanical device. They were artificially biological organisms that were similar to humans. These robots more closely resembled more modern conceptions such as replicants ( 1982 Blade Runner ) or android hosts ( 2016 Westworld television series ). Their skin and brains were produced in vats, their bones in factories, and their nerve fibers, arteries and intestines were spun on factory bobbins. The robots, themselves living biological beings, were finally assembled on factory lines as opposed to grown or born.

“R.U.R.” had its first theatrical premiere on the twenty-fifth of January in 1921 at Prague’s National Theater. English writer Paul Selver translated the play into English and sold it to St. Martin’s Theater in London. The translation was adapted for British theater by actor Sir Nigel Ross Playfair in 1922. Performance rights for the United States and Canada were sold in the same year to the New York Theater Guild. The American premiere of “R.U.R.” took place in October of 1922 at New York City’s Garrick Theater on 35th Street in Manhattan where it ran for one hundred and eighty-four performances. 

In April of 1923, actor and director Basil Dean produced “R.U.R.” in Britain for the Reandean Company at London’s St. Martin’s Theater. This version was based on Playfair’s adaptation and included several revisions from the New York Theater Guild. During the 1920s, the play was performed in several British and American theaters. In June of 1923, Karel Čapek sent a letter to translator Edward March with the play’s final lines that had been omitted from previous translations. A copy of this final and complete translation of Čapek’s play later appeared in the 2001 journal of “Science Fiction Studies”.

The BBC airing of Čapek’s “R.U.R.” occurred just two years after England launched the broadcasting service; it is unclear whether any recordings of the event survived. The play’s effects, though very rudimentary by today’s standards, made it very suitable for showing on the new television medium. Although its popularity peaked in the 1920s, Čapek’s “Rossum’s Universal Robots” became the foundation of many of science fiction’s modern franchises, both film and television. 

Calendar: February 10

Year: Day to Day Men: February 10

Bricks and Gecko

The tenth of February in 1939 marks the premiere of John Ford’s western film “Stagecoach” at the Lincoln Theatre in Miami Beach, Florida. The film was the first of many Westerns shot by director John Ford in Monument Valley, a region of the Colorado Plateau characterized by its cluster of sandstone buttes. The site, considered sacred by its inhabitants, lies within the land of the Navajo Nation.

“Stagecoach” is Dudley Nichols’s adaptation of the 1937 short story,”The Stage to Lordsburg”, written by author Ernst Haycox, a prolific writer of Western fiction. The story follows a group of individuals, primarily strangers, who journey by stagecoach through dangerous territory ruled by Apache warriors. John Ford bought the rights to the story soon after its publication in Collier’s magazine. He presented the “Stagecoach” project to several studios in Hollywood. However, none were interested in a big-budget Western film or Ford’s placing B-film actor John Wayne in the lead role.

David O. Selznick, an independent producer with his own studio, Selznick International Pictures, agreed to finance the production of “Stagecoach”. However, he had doubts about the casting choices and was frustrated about Ford’s indecision on the initial date of shooting. Ford withdrew the film from Selznick and approached independent producer Walter Wanger about the project. Although he had reservations about the project, Wanger agreed to finance the project with a proviso. He would provide two hundred-fifty thousand dollars to finance the film. However, though Ford could still cast John Wayne in the film, he had to give the lead credit to Clair Trevor. an already established actress. 

At the time of the filming, Clair Trevor had already starred in twenty-nine films, often in the lead role or the role of the heroine. After her role in “Stagecoach”, Trevor would be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in the 1937 “Dead End” and win that award for her role in the 1948 “Key Largo”. John Wayne, however, had played leading roles throughout the 1930s in numerous B-movies, mostly Westerns, without achieving stardom. His role as the Ringo Kid in “Stagecoach” became the breakthrough role that began Wayne’s career as a  mainstream star. Over the course of his fifty year acting career, Wayne appeared in one hundred sixty-nine feature films and numerous documentary and television appearances. 

The film’s  supporting cast included such experienced actors as stage and screen actor John Carradine; radio and character actor Andy Devine; Thomas Mitchell, the first male actor to gain the Triple Crown of Acting- an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Tony Award; theatrical actress Louise Platt; stage and film actor Donald Meek; and established western film stars Tom Tyler and Tim Holt. 

Ford’s “Stagecoach” was first released in Los Angeles on the second of February in 1939. It opened in Miami Beach on the tenth of February and had its nationwide release on the third of March in 1939. Met with immediate critical praise, the film is considered one of the most influential films ever made. The roles presented in “Stagecoach” have become archetypical characters for the Western film genre.  In 1995, the United States Library of Congress considered “Stagecoach” to be culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant for preservation in the National Film Registry.  

Ian Rank-Broadley

Ian Rank-Broadley, “Heroic Torso”, Bronze, Size 1.5 m, Edition of 3

Ian Ramk-Broadley is a British sculptor, one of Britain’s foremost medallic artists.  His effigy of H.M. Queen Elizabeth II appears on all UK and Commonwealth coinage since 1998. He has recently completed work on one of the most important war memorials since WWII, the Armed Forces Memorial at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire. .

The “Heroic Torso”, cast from bronze,  was inspired by Classical fragments but given a contemporary twist. The lizard attempts to conceal the maleness of the figure, and yet becomes the focus. This edition of the sculpture is in a private collection.

Calendar: February 9

Year: Day to Day Men: February 9

The Tufted Red Bench

The ninth of February in 1912 marks the birth date of Futabayama Sadaji, a Japanese professional sumo wrestler from the Oita Prefecture on the island of Kyūshū. He entered sumo in 1927 and became, from 1937 until he retired in 1945, the sport’s thirty-fifth yokozuna, a person of sumo’s highest rank. Futabayama won twelve yūshō, top division championships, and won sixty-nine consecutive bouts, an all-time record.

Born Akiyoshi Sadaji, Futabayama worked as a young boy on fishing boats. At the age of fifteen, he was recruitedin March of 1927 by the Tatsunami stable, one of the most prestigious in sumo. Futabayama entered the top makuuchi division at the beginning of 1932. The makuuchi is the top division of six divisions in sumo and is fixed at forty-two wrestlers ordered into five ranks according to their performance in previous tournaments. After many top division wrestlers went on strike, Futabayama was promoted from the middle of the second-ranked division, jūryō, to maegashira 4, a listing that placed him into the lowest rank of the top makuuchi division. He finished as runner-up in his second top-division tournament, proving himself worthy of his promotion.

Futabayama Sadaji is known for achieving the longest run of consecutive victories in sumo, sixty-nine victories over a period of three years, a record still standing as of 2020. This was a major achievement as a match may only last a few seconds and a wrestler’s concentration must constantly be at its highest level. During those three years, Futabayama was awarded increasingly higher rankings and finally achieved the ranking of yokozuna. On the third of January in 1939, he was finally defeated by maegashira Akinoumi Setsuo, a professional sumo wrestler from Hiroshima.

Futabayama won a total of twelve championships at a time when there were two tournaments held each year. He held the record until the number of tournaments per year were increased to six in the 1950s. Futabayama left the June 1945 tournament held in the bomb-damaged city of Kokugikan after the first day. He did not participate in the November 1945 tournament but, while attending it, announced his retirement. Futabayama had made the decision to retire a year earlier after suffering a loss to Azumafuji Kin’ichi, a sumo wrestler from Taitō, Tokyo. After his retirement, Futabayama’s victories were considered more remarkable as he revealed that he was blind in one eye.

In 1941, Futabayama Sadaji became the head of his own stable, the Futabayama Dojo, while he was still an active wrestler. Upon his retirement, he adopted the Tokitsukaze elder name and renamed his heya, Tokitsukaze stable. It became by the 1950s one of sumo’s largest stables and the source of many strong wrestlers. Futabayama was chairman of the Japan Sumo Association from 1957 and remained in charge of his stable until his death from hepatitis in December of 1968 at the age of fifty-six. 

Notes: At 1.79 meters (5 feet 10 inches) and 128 kilograms (282 pounds), Futabayama was known for his exceptional tactics in the tachi-ai, the initial phase of the sumo match. He was an expert at the gonosen no tachi-ai, the immediate countering of an opponent’s charge. Futabayama had excellent balance and was feared for his uwatenage, or overarm throw.

Bottom Insert Image: Photographer Unknown, “Futabayama Sadaji Performing the Yokosuna Dohyō, the Ring-Entering Ceremony”, Date Unknown, Vintage Print