Betty Mitchell

Janet Money is a writer and policy analyst for the Canadian Cystic
Fibrosis Foundation in Toronto.

To have known Betty Mitchell, it seems, was to respect and love her. Mitchell (1896-1976), a pioneer of amateur theatre in Western Canada, taught drama at Calgary’s Western Canada High School (1934-61) and founded the Workshop 14 theatre group that won many awards at the Dominion Drama Festival.

Unfortunately for those who did not know her, this biography, by Kenneth Dyba, one of her former students, is flawed by the very devotion that prompted its writing.

With the exception of an introduction, the inclusion of her University of Iowa thesis and a section of reminiscences of former students and colleagues, the book is comprised entirely of transcripts of tapes Dyba made at interviews with Mitchell; and poorly edited transcripts at that.

Actor Chris Wiggins, one of the devotees who pens a fond remembrance at the back of the book, admits that Mitchell’s grand phrasing could sound affected or pompous to new acquaintances but notes that beneath them was “not thin air but the mind like a gin trap.”

Readers introduced to Mitchell through these transcripts may have difficulty delving beneath the grand phrasing. Dyba’s task should have been to lead us to the real person, perhaps by editing out all the “darling’s” and “now, I ask you’s” and comments on the weather, or perhaps by supplying background information that would have placed the monologue in context. No doubt, Betty Mitchell is a labour of love, but such a respected teacher deserves a more carefully constructed biography.