Editing Lynn Fontanne (section)

===Theatre Guild===
[[File:Pygmalion-Fontanne-Travers-1926.jpg|thumb|upright|As Eliza in ''[[Pygmalion (play)|Pygmalion]]'', 1926, with [[Henry Travers]] as Doolittle|alt=young white woman in Japanese kimono worn as a dressing gown, next to standing middle-aged man in working clothes raising his hand threateningly, ignored by her]]
In 1924, the Lunts joined the company of the [[Theatre Guild]], which, in the words of Fontanne's biographer Jared Brown, "staged plays on Broadway but defied Broadway conventions by offering serious and innovative plays that were regularly rejected by commercial managements".<ref name=anb>Brown, Jared. [https://www-anb-org.wikipedialibrary.idm.oclc.org/view/10.1093/anb/9780198606697.001.0001/anb-9780198606697-e-1801349 "Lunt, Alfred (12 August 1892 – 03 August 1977), and Lynn Fontanne (06 December 1887 – 30 July 1983), actors and producers"] ''American National Biography''. Oxford University Press, 1999. Retrieved 23 August 2021 {{subscription required}}</ref> The first play in which the couple appeared for the Guild was [[Ferenc Molnár]]'s ''The Guardsman,'' in which they established a reputation for playing light comedy.<ref name=anb/> They acted together in three plays by [[George Bernard Shaw|Bernard Shaw]]: ''[[Arms and the Man]]'' (as Raina and Bluntschli, 1925), ''[[Pygmalion (play)|Pygmalion]]'' (as Eliza and Higgins, 1926) and ''[[The Doctor's Dilemma (play)|The Doctor's Dilemma]]'' (as the Dubedats, 1927).<ref name=ww/><ref name=al>Herbert, pp. 1110–1111</ref> Fontanne had the chance to demonstrate her versatility by switching from comedy to demanding experimental drama in [[Eugene O'Neill]]'s ''[[Strange Interlude]]'' (1928), described by Woollcott as "the ''[[Abie's Irish Rose]]'' of the pseudo-intelligentsia".<ref>Burns, p. 91</ref>

Fontanne and Lunt introduced a naturalistic new way of delivering dialogue, building on a technique Fontanne had begun to explore in her performances with Laurette Taylor. It was unheard of for an actor to speak while another was still speaking, but, in Brown's words:
{{blockindent|The Lunts …. perfected the use of overlapping dialogue … although both actors were speaking at the same time, the audience would not miss a word spoken by either. Great skill was required in order to bring off this effect successfully. Lunt spoke in a slightly different rhythm and at a slightly different pitch than Fontanne; each modulated his or her volume level to accommodate the other; and, perhaps most difficult of all, they made the effect sound perfectly natural.<ref name=anb/>|}}

As a consequence, according to Brown, the Lunts' scenes together could be "more vivid, more ''real'' than those of other actors".<ref name=anb/>{{refn|The English humorous writer [[Arthur Marshall (broadcaster)|Arthur Marshall]] wrote that the Lunts' technique brought about a revolution in comedy acting: "Never before had such playing been seen. … actors waited to speak until somebody else had finished… The Lunts turned all that upside down. They threw away lines, they trod on each other’s words, they gabbled, they whispered, they spoke at the same time. They spoke, in fact, as people do in ordinary life, a theatrical innovation that nobody seems to have tried before".<ref>Marshall, p. 95</ref>|group=n}}
[[File:The-Lunts-1925.png|thumb|upright|left|The Lunts, mid-1920s|alt=Young man and young woman, white, in studio portrait]]
In 1928, Fontanne and Lunt co-starred in what for the Guild was an untypically frothy comedy, ''Caprice''. The biographer [[Margot Peters]] calls the production a milestone in their careers for two reasons: it was the first production in which they, rather than the play, were the main draw, and it marked the start of their inseparable theatrical partnership: from then on they always appeared together. They took ''Caprice'' to London in 1930 – Lunt's first appearance there – and won the admiration of audiences, critics, and writers including Shaw and [[J. B. Priestley]].<ref>Peters, pp. 100–101</ref> For the Guild in New York, Fontanne and Lunt starred in [[Robert E. Sherwood|Robert Sherwood's]] romantic comedy ''Reunion in Vienna'' which opened in November 1931 and ran throughout the season, before a nationwide tour.<ref name=ww/> The two were strong believers in touring, taking many of their Broadway hits to remote locations as well as the larger American cities. They felt a double responsibility to do so: to ensure that playwrights had their works presented to as many people as possible, and to allow people outside New York to see Broadway productions.<ref name=anb/>