The Redgrave Legacy

In response to letter writer A.F. Sanders’ diatribe in the Dec. 30 issue:

“Morgan,” “Blow-Up,” “Isadora,” “The Devils,” “Mary, Queen of Scots,” “Julia,” “Playing for Time,” “The Bostonians,” “Wetherby,” “Second Serve,” “A Man for All Seasons,” “Prick Up Your Ears” and “Orpheus Descending” for film and television.

“Orpheus” again, “Cymbeline,” “As You Like It,” “The Seagull,” “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie,” “Lady From the Sea,” “Touch of the Poet,” “Major Barbara,” “Three Penny Opera,” “Ghosts,” “Twelfth Night,” “Antony and Cleopatra” and “The Taming of the Shrew” on stage.

Vanessa Redgrave’s great legacy of artistic achievements will live a long time after her politics, Mr. Sanders’ politics, my politics or anyone else’s politics have vanished from all memory. Her right to the expression of her Gargantuan artistic gifts, as well as her political beliefs (however wrong-headed, confused and impetuous they might be), is a right that any real American would grant her and help her guard savagely.

So Mr. Sanders doesn’t “give a bloody damn about her ability,” eh? Neither, I am certain, would Jesse Helms, Joseph McCarthy (in his dark day), Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon, all of whom advanced their own political careers by stripping artists of their artistic ones. And all of whom were “good Americans.”

My (for lack of a better word) eye.

STEVE DUNAWAY

Los Angeles