European Theatre - The work of Bertolt Brecht
Who is Bertolt Brecht?
Bertolt Brecht was a famous German playwright, theater critic, and director. He created and advanced the form of epic theater, believing that plays should be tools for political and social activism rather than solely entertainment. His company, the Berliner Ensemble, became one of the most famous touring companies in the world and to this day continues to produce politically-minded work in the Brechtian style.Born in 1898 to middle-class parents in Bavaria, Bertolt Brecht grew up in a comfortable lifestyle. In elementary school, he met Caspar Nehar, who would become a life-long friend and go on to design sets for many of Brecht’s plays. As a student at Munich University during World War I, the playwright studied theater and became fascinated with German cabaret performances, particularly the work of comedian Karl Valentin.
Bertolt Brecht began writing plays around this time, which enjoyed some commercial success and critical acclaim. He also spent time studying the work of political theorist Karl Marx and socialism. He began to form his theory of “epic theater.” This theater, departing from the traditional aims of drama as described by Aristotle, was not meant to be an imitation of reality or a device of entertainment.
Brechtian Techniques
Brecht's Epic Theatre
When Brecht was looking for a term that would encompass the type of theatre he was looking to create, he was influenced by the work of Erwin Piscator, an established German director who during the 1920s and 30s was involved in the creation of new theatre forms. Piscator was the first person to coin the phrase Epic Theatre, a term that Brecht is often associated with.
The Epic PlayThe Epic Play will follow a story familiar to the audience. The story is often in the form of a fable, or it will show historical events. Brecht's intention in using known material was to make it unsensational: by taking away any attraction-grabbing ‘wrapping' that an original story may have, Brecht was stripping away a disguise that dramatic theatre often uses.
The form of an epic play is episodic. Whereas the plays of Ibsen or Chekhov will construct scenes that relate directly to every other scene, Brecht's plays consist of a series of lone standing, loosely connected scenes. Scenes were often book ended with musical interludes, captions or gestures. These interludes allowed the audience to reflect critically on what they had just witnessed and also prevented feelings of empathy or the illusion of reality.His plays were able to stand-alone as Brecht wished to illustrate a story of perspective from many different viewpoints. He likened it to 10 different people witnessing the same car crash. The retelling of the story will be slightly different from each person as they have seen it from a different angle.
The characters in the epic play represent an individual who in turn represents all humankind. This also assists in breaking any empathy that one might feel for a character.
The Epic Actor
Epic Actors serve as narrators and demonstrators. They retell events and in doing so demonstrate actions and events that assist in the audience's understanding the situation. Brecht wanted his actors to always remember that they are an actor portraying another's emotions, feelings and experiences.
To assist in achieving this, Brecht often used a device or theatrical technique called Gestus. Gestus was a gesture or position that an actor would take up at crucial sections in the play. The gesture or action aimed to encapsulate the feelings of the character at the one time, and also briefly stopped the action. The most famous Gestus ever used was in Brecht's Mother Courage where the character of Mother Courage looks out to the audience, her face posed in a silent scream.The Epic Stage
Brecht envisaged the Epic Stage as a place for discussion. The audience is presented with a topic of social or political relevance and an opinion or message on said topic. The epic stage provides its audience with questions, possible solutions and actively encourages them to think, determine and act.
Brecht had no desire to hide any of the elements of theatrical production. Lighting, music, scenery, costume changes, acting style, projections and any other elements he called upon were in full view of the audience; a reminder that they are in a theatre, and what they are watching is not real.Brecht also wished to change the scale of the properties used, and then also use them out of context. For example, using a skyscraper that makes up part of the set and turning it over to use as a judges table in a courtroom. This challenged the audience, and also reminded them that they were watching something that was being manufactured, and not real life.
The Alienation Effect
Perhaps the best known technique of Brecht's epic theatre is the Alienation Effect: to make the familiar strange. Although the term ‘alienate' may conjure up images of separating one thing from another by building a wall, this is not the case. The A-effect takes "…the human social incidents to be portrayed and label[s] them as something striking, something that calls for explanation, is not to be taken for granted…" (Willet 125) The purpose is that the audience be put in a situation where they can reflect critically in a social context.
The Epic Audience"The one tribute we can pay the audience is to treat it as thoroughly intelligent. It is utterly wrong to treat people as simpletons when they are grown up at seventeen. I appeal to the reason."(Willet, 14)
The Relaxed Audience is how Brecht referred to the audience he wished the epic theatre to attract. Brecht often spoke of what he termed a ‘smoker's theatre', where audience members would puff on cigars, much like they would at a boxing match, whilst watching a performance. The relaxed audience are interested in what they are watching; they are there to be entertained, and to think.Although epic theatre is often perceived as lacking in emotion or entertainment value, Brecht was actually intent on creating a theatrical experience that entertained, educated and provoked thought. This misconception seems to stem from the notion that entertainment and education cannot co-exist. However his productions used intelligent humour, dance, music, clowning and colour to tell stories with high political and social content. After all, theatre is supposed to represent life, and life is derived from of combination of the personal, social and political climate of the time.
(Extracted from http://www.usq.edu.au/artsworx/schoolresources/goodwomanofszechwan/epictheatre)
Threepenny Opera
Polly, the only daughter of Mr. Peachum, king of the beggars, marries the notorious thief Macheath. Motivated by his own self-interest, Peachum not only disapproves of the match, but he also sees Macheath as a mortal enemy and threat to his business. He and his wife, Celia, hatch a plan to get Macheath arrested and hanged, but Polly informs them that London’s chief of police, Tiger Brown, attended their wedding as a friend of the groom. The two friends, who served together in the Indian army, enjoy a symbiotic relationship in which Brown informs Macheath of possible arrests, and Macheath lets Brown know when a crime is about to take place.
When Macheath enters the brothel, Jenny reads his palm, suggesting that Macheath will be betrayed by someone whose name begins with the letter J. Soon after, Constable Smith captures him and throws him in jail at the Old Bailey. Polly visits him in jail, but Lucy, Brown’s daughter and another of Macheath’s women, interrupts them. Lucy and Polly begin arguing over who is the rightful wife of Macheath. Lucy reveals that she’s pregnant. After Polly—kicking and screaming—is collected by Mrs. Peachum, Macheath asks Lucy to bring him his hat and cane. Smith soon opens the cage to remove Macheath’s personal effects, but while the door is open, Macheath escapes.
Jenny goes to Peachum’s office and demands her ten shillings. When Mrs. Peachum denies her payment because of Macheath’s escape, Jenny betrays his location once again, revealing that he is with the prostitute Suky Tawdry. Brown bursts in to arrest Peachum for threatening to set his beggars loose at the coronation. Brown orders the constables to arrest the beggars, but Peachum warns Brown that capturing them will disrupt the coronation, create a huge mess for the police, and ruin Brown’s reputation as sheriff. Prompted by Peachum, Jenny reveals Macheath’s location once again, and Brown calls an emergency conference of sergeants. Peachum sends the beggars to the jail, expecting that the police will capture Macheath.
Quickly discovered, Macheath is thrown back in jail and informed that he will be executed on Friday at six in the evening. Macheath attempts to bribe Smith with a thousand pounds, although a consultation with two of his fellow thieves reveals that only the sum of four hundred pounds is available. When Smith goes to fetch Macheath’s last meal, Polly and Brown enter with their apologies and last words and are soon joined by the rest of the characters. Macheath cries for mercy, but when the group reaches the gallows, a mounted messenger appears, bringing news that the queen has demanded the release of Macheath. As the crowd cheers, both Mr. and Mrs. Peachum address the audience, reminding them that happy endings do not happen in reality.
Week 1 Rehearsal Evaluation.
Myself, Tracy and Ayo where given the assignment that we would be doing Bertolt Brecht theatre which was very exciting and challenging news. We were given the play Three penny opera by Nick and Yusuf.
I was given the character Jonathan Peachum was the 'king' of the beggars whilst Tracy played Celia Peachum (My wife) and Ayo played an aspiring beggar called Filch.
we started of by going through the script and breaking down the text to get a further understanding of the scene. We also started playing around with personality of the characters we were playing , changing the tone of voice and physicality which is essential becuase brecht characters are usually big and exaggerated.
Week 2 Rehearsal Evaluation.
This week went through the text a few times doing it in different ways for example, I done the first run through of the scene in an american accent but very quickly i realised this did not suit the text at all so i kept changing my physicallity and accent to see what would fit. I also referred back to some youtube videos to see what was the common theme used for threepenny opera for my character. the common choice of accent was a cockeny (london accent) which i tried out and it seem to work quite well. Tracy and ayo also done the same with there character in order for the scene to flow and make sense.
Week 3 Rehearsal Evaluation.
This week we decided to go with the london cockney theme for our characters. we chose it because the tone of the accent fitted the plot of the scene as it is set in london. we then started focussing on our physicallity of the character which is essential because brechtian theatre requires alot of exaggeration in gestures and movement. we also started doing minor blockings and playing with the text to see how we can portray this scene to the audience. I was also considering the mindset of my character Mr.Peachum and started to try and break down his personality. I started getting the feeling from the text that Mr.Peachum is a very Arrogant man who likes to be in control of things so i started to make that clear in my posture and acting, I also thought that this sort of character needed to be of the older generation, around his 40's to 50's to accomodate his arrogance and self superiority towards the other beggars and his family. Peachum is the proprietor of “The Beggar’s Friend.” Conniving and hypocritical, Peachum outfits poor men as panhandlers to evoke extra sympathy and then demands a percentage of their profits. He trusts no one, not even his wife and daughter. When he learns that his daughter, Polly, has married Macheath, he is sure that his new son-in-law will hurt his business so i really tried to bring that out with his phyical and mental attitude.Week 4 Rehearsal Evaluation.
Ayo and I started adding bits to the blocking in order to make certain points made in the dialogue more clear for the audience to understand. We also started learning the intro song for the play (Mac the Knife) which is a famous song, but due to the lack of people memerising the words we scrapped it. We then started blocking an alternative introduction into our scene. Yusuf decided we shouldstart it of at busy market, incorporting other students who do others scenes of the play and making it look frantic and messy. we started bringing in props and trying on costumes for our character to start getting a feel of how we want our charater to look .
Week 5 Rehearsal Evaluation.
This week we started looking at our costumes and what we were going to use as props, i decided that Mr.Peachum should have a Gentlemens sort of look but not look to posh or rich because he was the on the top end of the poor. also i was still concerned about the phyiscallity of Peachum, I wanted him to have a distinct movement or gesture on stage that exagerrates the character more. We also started blocking more without our script and adding bits and pieces to make the scene make more sense.Week 6 Rehearsal Evaluation.
This week we were all off script and continued to add more blocking to parts of dialogue that required 'Beefing up' in order to entice the audiences attention to important things in the dialogue and to also keep there interest throughout the scene, so we as a group tried to add more comedy moments . We also watched a film of the Threepenny Opera and i actually found it quite boring and long (also it was a musical) but what i did get from it was that Mr.Peachum was portrayed as an old man in this film which reassured me on my take of the character. I was particulary trying to find a prop that suited Peachum so I looked at props like a pipe and a top hat which looked pretty decent.Week 7 Rehearsal Evaluation.
This week we were prepping for the performance so we started painting signs for the market scene and for my starting monologue which requires signs with quotes from the bible. so we started getting all the materials and props needed for the performance . I also included a walking stick to my character which allowed to do much more on stage on how i command things and move around which makes it very distinctive of Mr.Peachums personality, i wanted to give the impression of a grumpy old man which helped with the walking stick.
Week 8 Rehearsal Evaluation.
Peformance week and we have now fully blocked the scene and rehearsed it on stage with lighting and props in place. I got some good feedback from Alex saying how he liked my Physicallity and use of props, He said i had to work on clartiy of some words in the dialogue to make it more clear to the audience. and instead of a pipe I should use a bluggered out cigar. he also noted that i should change how i do the ending to give it more of an effect on the audience. Ayo had been given some very important advice by nick on how his character should come across towards the audience and in the scene and after that it seemed asif the pieces of the puzzle came together and it worked brilliantly. all the blocking and added bits we put in made sense and it was very clear. The inclusion of props made it easier to exaggerate gestures and movement which was fun and we also had a clear sense of purpose and direction within our character.Nick also made the whole class be painted with white faces and drawn on eyebrows and moustaches which gave it a brilliant brecht style effect. The painted faces really exaggerated our gestures perfectly and it also gave it that unreal element that makes brechtian style theatre. The comedy moments were just right but not to much which gave away the moral of the play. So we kepy it in balance with Brecht techniques and the direction of the scene. In my opinion i believe Myself, Tracy and Ayo worked well together and gave equal amounts of positive contribution towards the piece.
The Performance
The performance went very well, The audience laughed at the parts where we added in the comedy moments and also understood the dialogue and scenario well from feedback after the show. It was also said that our performance was believable and clear. I said the dialogue with conviction and convincing timing asif what im reacting to is new to me and not rehearsed. I really wanted to give a spontaneous feel to the scene so nothing feels scripted. Also a good example for when I used a comedy moment is when Ayo (Filch) throws some clothes at me where i react with disgust and astonishment, instead when he done it this time during the performance I turned to the audience with a puzzled face then turned to Filch, Turned to the audience again and then filch, Turn to the audience a last time and they started bursting out with laughter after i done it the third time, then carried on with the dialogue. that was a split second decision where i felt i can play with the audience a bit and it worked tremendously.
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