THE BECKETT CIRCLE LE CERCLE DE BECKETT O N e w s l e t t e r o f t h e S a m u e l B e c k e t t S o c i e t y This metaphor goes together well with Peter Brook’s Brook’s general approach to Beckett’s play. As he repeatedly told the press, he treated Glückliche Tage the text like a musician dealing with a musi- cal score, trying not to change anything in it Directing for the first time in German (and in (since that would only harm the result), but Basel), Peter Brook has brought out a new ver- to “play” what is given with the greatest pos- sion of the Beckett play that he staged with such sible precision. According to Mannes, Brook success in Lausanne in 1995. Having wanted for concentrated on technical details, putting the some time to stage Glückliche Tage with Miriam play’s ambiguities to the side and gently, but Goldschmidt — an actress with whom he has firmly, steering the actors away from questions had a long-standing professional relationship of motivation and meaning. Brook stressed the — in the role of Winnie, Brook decided that theatrical effect itself as the ultimate test for the time was now right. As he told the Baseler any new ideas, and even his assistant director Zeitung, Goldschmidt had reached a point did not entirely know what overall concept lay in her artistic career where she could make behind specific decisions. Much of this seems her own unique contribution to the play. She close to Beckett’s own approach to his plays as had, in particular, developed a fine sense for a director, and Brook in fact included the revi- linguistic nuances that she could bring to a sions that Beckett had made for the “score” of play that imposes severe restrictions on bodily his 1979 Royal Court production of Happy Days forms of expression. German (Goldschmidt’s (as published by James Knowlson in 1985). mother tongue) was chosen, for this reason, In keeping with this insistence on “musical” as the language for this production, a choice faithfulness, he only deviated from this basic that also tied in well with Brook’s more general text in a few isolated cases. interest in crossing boundaries and exploring The most obvious of these concerns the stage different cultures. His assistant director Hen- set. Winnie’s mound is back in the center, since drik Mannes told me that Brook greatly en- Brook thought the visual arrangement would joyed directing in German, often switching to not “work” without symmetry. It is perhaps it even though the official working language of not surprising that this advocate of “the empty the team was English. Brook himself told the Neue Züricher Zeitung that he situates Ger- man, as a theatrical In This Issue: language, somewhere between (Irish-)Eng- Beckett in: lish and French: less Basel direct and rough than London Roussillon the former and with- Marjorie Perloff on out the latter’s trans- Words and Music parency. Brook also Upcoming Events enjoyed the challenge Book Reviews of attempting to ex- Presidential Mes- press ambiguities and sage subtexts in German. Contributors He compared this change of language Fall 2003 to playing a musical Volume 26 composition with a Winnie (Miriam Goldschmidt) celebrates another happy day in the tenu- No. 2 different set of instru- ous company of Willie (Wolfgang Kroke) in Peter Brook’s German produc- ments. tion of Beckett’s play. space” reduced the sky to a turquoise ribbon on Winne’s the voices that she adopts for Mr Shower/Cooker and hat (and a similar decoration on her dress in Act I). Mannes his wife, as well as for Milly’s story, which verge on ham reports that Brook considered the original trompe-l’oeil acting. Miriam Goldschmidt worked with Mannes to de- backcloth as belonging too much to the “theater of the velop these different registers, and Brook readily accepted absurd” of the previous century. In the stage-set designed them when he came to Basel. It is not surprising that, by Abdou Ouologuem, uniformly dark-brown fabric em- given such an approach, laughter was prominent among phasises the walls at the back and at the two sides of the the audience’s reactions – much more so than in the 1995 set. Brook’s Winnie is thus always also an actress at the version. In commenting on the Basel production, Brook centre of what appears to drew a parallel between be a conventional the comic elements fourth-wall stage. i n B e c k e t t ’ s The mound itself Mannes reports that Brook considered the original works and the is made of goat trompe-l’oeil backcloth as belonging too much to South African and sheep hides, theatre in the which were im- the “theater of the absurd” of the previous century. Apartheid era: ported directly from both combine an Mali. At the edges, unmitigated focus the stage-floor remains visible, thus high- lighting the on the horrid facts of existence with an encouraging buoy- metatheatrical level. Although some dried-up plants are ancy. According to Mannes, audiences at all of the Basel there to suggest scorching heat, the overall colour range performances laughed at the same places in Act I while of warm-brown and ochre seems much more welcom- in Act II their responses varied from day to day. In the ing than Beckett’s stage directions indicate; it also differs performance that I saw, the audience quickly overcame from the bleached-out set of Brook’s 1995 production. In the shock of Winnie’s even more extreme confinement in contrast to the complete barrenness conveyed by sand Act II and continued to laugh, just as she kept on playing and stones, the animal hides – though dead – are at least for theatrical effect with the diminished means at her dis- associated with past life, just as the glowing yellow of posal. Although an air of desolation always lurked in her Philippe Vialatte’s lighting lacks the glaring harshness to wide-open eyes, her breakdowns were hardly more fre- which Beckett subjected both his characters and his audi- quent than in the first act and almost as fleeting. Even the ence. Similarly, the universe seems kinder to Winnie with screams that Winnie emits while recounting the story of regard to the objects that are still at her disposal. Instead Milly lacked any “piercing” quality and appeared almost of a bag, the depths of which she can never penetrate, she ridiculously artificial. Throughout, she always seemed to is equipped with an open, box-like construction that al- rally a bit too quickly, just before rather than just after she lows her to survey her possessions at any given moment. had glimpsed the appalling emptiness of her situation. According to Mannes, Brook did not see this change as Thus, instead of expressing despair, her voice was harsh, problematic, because for him the bag was a “secondary” almost sarcastic when she twice qualified her “happy prop, less central to the orchestration of the play than the day” with ‘”trotz allem” (“after all”) in the last scene. This “primary” ones of revolver, toothbrush, and parasol. Winnie stayed mentally in control until the very end. The suggestions of greater vitality in the stage-set fit in It seems tempting to make a connection here with well with the protagonist herself, especially in comparison Brook’s statement in “Dire oui à la boue” – a translation with Natasha Parry’s 1995 Winnie. Goldschmidt’s charac- of which is reprinted in the programme — that Beckett’s ter oscillates between her philosophical thoughts and her plays show an acceptance of fate. Winnie expresses an very down-to-earth attitude to life. According to Mannes, optimism that makes her tragically blind to her living Brook paid special attention to creating a tension between conditions. As Brook had already explained in The Empty these two extremes; Winnie is part of earth and of heaven, Space, the spectator falls prey to a related delusion when always pulled down again when she feels she is about to s/he accuses Beckett of pessimism. Of course, my impres- float upwards into the light. Thus, her laughter has a dis- sion may also be due to the specific performance I saw. tinctly vulgar touch, like her make-up and her manner of Mannes assured me that the contrast between the two acts speaking in a number of scenes. In the first act she touches had been much more pronounced in the previous day’s her bosom and fiddles with her dress to draw attention to performance, in which the audience was unable to laugh her living body. It is, to be sure, no coincidence that her during Act II. Personally, I would have preferred a greater delight during the postcard scene is played up in this pro- emphasis on Winnie’s anguish towards the end, such as duction, with only the most perfunctory attempt to hide was found in Brook’s 1995 version. The performance that I it behind righteous indignation. Brook himself stressed saw sometimes made it too easy for the audience, encour- that Goldschmidt should have a fleshly presence on stage; aging it to laugh at times at a clichéd marital situation in similarly, he made not only the head of Wolfgang Kroke’s which a chattering, overbearing wife complains that her Willie visible behind the mound, but his bare shoulders husband is not listening to her. as well.