Dangerously modern: Shakespeare, voice, and the “New Psychology” in John Barrymore’s “Unstable” characters

Abstract

This chapter demonstrates three areas of John Barrymore’s acting style as it developed in the 1920s and early 1930s and how he adapted to the sound film. After a successful silent career Barrymore’s voice was heard in his rendition of Shakespeare’s Richard III soliloquy through Warner Bros.’ new Vitaphone sound system in the variety film The Show of Shows (1929). It added a depth of acting virtuosity that had been hinted at in the physicality of his performance in the silent Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1920) and The Sea Beast (1926). It became an important part of a turn toward playing roles of aberrant masculinity such as Svengali (1931) and The Mad Genius (1931). Secondly, in his introduction to the scene Barrymore says the soliloquy “discloses [Richard’s] own piquant psychology.” He is referring to the wider cultural context of a popularisation of Freud’s theories at the time. This “new psychology” was not only carried through in the creation of Barrymore’s Richard III and Hamlet but was an important element in making Barrymore’s interpretations of the Bard “modern.” Finally, the “danger” that Barrymore carried from his Shakespearean roles became a central element in the unstable characters he chose to play in his Warner’s sound films. This chapter examines that instability arguing it was predicated on a modern conception of psychic wounding in the motivations of Ahab in Moby Dick (1930), the more fantastic characters of Svengali (1931) and Tsarakov in The Mad Genius, and in his later portrayal of war veteran Hilary Fairfield in Bill of Divorcement (1932).

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