Home Service
Examiner of Plays' Summary:
This is the melodrama, effectively worked out, of the firm of Smith and Schmidt, an Englishman and a naturalized German, the former with a daughter whom he is anxious to see married to the latter's son. The action opens just before war breaks out, when the partners are just retiring and leaving the business to their sons. Both lads join the army, young Schmidt as British at heart as young Smith, who soons get killed. Gradually it leaks out that old Schmidt is a traitor though his wife and son are true to their adopted land. During an air-raid it is discovered that Schmidt is in league with the raiders and the sensation-scene of the play is that in which his own son shoots him dead to prevent him using a time-bomb for supplementing the Zeppelin's work, while additional poignance is given to the situation by the fact that Mrs Schmidt is singing at a concert in the cellars to keep up the courage of the workpeople. The horror is built up effectively, though with an amateurish touch: and both action and dialogue are more plausible than is usual in such 'thriller's. The love-interest is quite wholesome if not very convincing: and the play as a whole may go well with audiences just now. Care must be taken however, not to make the bomb-explosion at the end of act IV too realistic in noise. Recommended for License. Ernest A. Bendal. [The following is written in ink below] Written undertaking given that the sound of a bomb explosion will be given by means of the big drum.
Researcher's Summary:
‘Home Service; or Smith and Schmidt’ was performed in Eastbourne on 22-27 April 1918 by the Convalescent Comedy Company from Summerdown Camp. The Camp opened in 1915 as a convalescent home for wounded soldiers and at its height contained 3,500 wounded men who were known locally as the ‘Blueboys’ on account of the colour of their uniforms. The male actors were either convalescent servicemen or members of staff and the female actors were Eastbourne residents. Although later in the year the producer Bernard Hishin secured the rights to the play and hoped to stage it in London before Christmas (Daily Mirror, 26 August 1918; Westminster Gazette, 21 September 1918), it seems not to have been revived.
Licensed On: 16 Apr 1918
License Number: 1526
Genre(s):
Keyword(s):
British Library Reference: LCP1918/7
British Library Classmark: Add MS 66189 Z
Performances
| Date | Theatre | Type | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 22 Apr 1918 | Devonshire Park Theatre, Eastbourne | Unknown | Licensed Performance |
| 22 Apr 1918 | Devonshire Park Theatre, Eastbourne | Amateur |
Read Narrative
‘Great interest centres in the production on Monday evening next of Captain C. F. Armstrong’s new wartime play, Home Service, or Smith v. Schmidt … There is, by the way, a scenic effect in the third act, of which much is hoped. It is the handiwork of Private Berrecloth, of the “Buffs,” now a Summerdown Camp convalescent … by dint of artistry and ingenious mechanical effect, one is supposed to witness all the weird, terrifying spectacle of an air battle across a vista of city roofs. Aeroplanes are seen buzzing overhead, and finally a blazing Zeppelin dives to death. This, one hopes, is as near to the real thing as Eastbourne will ever have it! The play is now fully rehearsed, booking has opened well, and everything points to success on Monday and during the week’ (Eastbourne Chronicle, 20 April 1918). ‘Capt. Armstrong must be congratulated upon the success the production of his war drama met with on Monday. A large audience followed the exciting incidents with close attention and evident approval ... the air-raid scene [was] an especially realistic effect' (The Stage, 25 April 1918). ‘A large audience extended a very cordial reception on Monday night to Capt. Cecil F. Armstrong’s new drama, Home Service, for which a highly creditable first public performance was given by the talented artists cast for the production. The combination appearing in the piece was described as the “Convalescent Comedy Company from Summerdown Camp,” ad with the exception of the ladies, who are Eastbourne residents, the whole of the performers are located at the Camp, either as members of the staff or as convalescent birds of passage. Within the compass of four acts the author has constructed a most interesting and spirited war-time play, in which the idea of “once a German always a German” is dramatised with no mean skill and patriotic fervour … The proceeds are to be applied to various deserving “war” organisations’ (Eastbourne Chronicle, 27 April 1918). ‘The author has taken full advantage of current events and sentiment to produce a play of much interest. He has handled his subject deftly and with due restraint, but in the second scene of Act III. he breaks loose, and the skies are pieced by searchlights, the scene is lurid with exploding bombs, a faithful old servant is throttled, and the villain is discovered, denounced, and shot by his own son. The scene and effects, which materially helped on the opening night to arouse the enthusiastic applause of the audience, were invented by a man in khaki – in fact, nearly all the male members of the cast are “boys in blue,” and by them the author has been served with skilful help and painstaking labour’ (The Era, 1 May 1918).
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