War Play Was Devised in Consultation with Paul Germany

In September, 1935 Weill open-air theatre in North (190D-1950) travelled to Carolina). The result of America for the first time this collaboration was in order to oversee the Johnny Johnson, which staging of his and Franz was written and com Werfel's biblical drama posed in the summer of The Eternal Road, which 1936 and staged for the was due to be performed first time that December, early the following year. in New York. Owing to the indefinite Although the production postponement of that production , he decided to was hardly more to the taste of the Broadway remain in New York temporarily. lt was not public than The Threepenny Opera had until the summer of 1937 been three years earlier, that he took the first steps towards American the press was highly fa citizenship. vourable. Among the theatrical intelligentsia in While trying to earn his New York Weill's already keep in New York, Weill high reputation was consolidated his links consolidated ; and in with the Group Theater. recent years Johnny In the spring of 1936 he Johnson has found was invited to collaborate increasing acceptance with the Group Theater as one of the classics of on a musical play whose American music theatre. subject he himself was to The fact that Weill's chose. He recom mended an American score, like the play, is far removed from the version of Hasek's Good Soldier Svejk. With this Broadway style of the day is as apparent as is in view, the Group Thea ter introduced him to the the relationship with Weill's two 'Berlin' musi distinguished playwright Paul Green, a life-long cals for the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm. Weill experimenter in new forms (and a pioneer of himself acknowledges this relationship by 15 means of several brief the one hand a brilliant and functional quota persiflage of such songs tions-one from The (and incidentally the first Threepenny Opera and 'blues' he wrote on the remainder (including American soil) ; on the a complete melody) from other, the work of a Happy End. The latter is composer who under indeed the direct fore stood, as well as any, the bear of Johnny Johnson. manifold ironies of Cosi lt contains the most out fan tutte. spokenly 'American' song Weill composed in War Play was devised in consultation with Paul Germany. However, in Johnny Johnson , the Green , as one of the elements in a so-called range of American refer ence is much wider than Kurt Wei/1 Portrait anything implicit in the mounted by the Berlin Festival in 1975. As the earlier work's 'Song of the Hard Nut.' title suggests, it was confined to those num Though still consciously bers in the original show composing as a Euro which relate directly to pean, Weill recalls, with the war theme ; and it a smile, the American was specifically intended hits of World War I, for the second of two evoking the times when War and Peace program America was singing mes planned by the George M. Cohan's present author and 'Over There' and patri performed at the Berlin otic ditties with such Academy of Arts by a titles as 'Good Luck to group of soloists and the the USA,' 'The Ragtime London Sinfonietta con Volunteers are off to ducted by David Ather War' and 'Au Revoir but ton. not Goodbye Soldier Boy.' Weill's own 'Fare War Play is designed to complement Johnny well Song' is characteris tically double-edged-on Johnson, not in any way to compete with it. AI- 17 though its structure is in vocal reasons}, the music were presented in the dependent of any drama remains exactly as Weill form of loudspeaker an tis personae other than wrote it-an ideal which in nouncements, either the historical ones, and normal theatre conditions between the numbers or any narrative elements is well-nigh unattainable. in conjunction with purely other than history itself, Paul Green's text for the instrumental music which War Play inevitably songs and choruses are had originally accompa follows the play's broad likewise preserved intact, nied spoken dialogue or outline. For the work is but a German version stylised action. The pro determined by the musi has been supplied for gramme notes explained cal and poetic content of 'Song of the Soldier's that the documentary the musical Mother.' elements (which are also numbers-including those being used, in a slightly For the 1975 Berlin per relevant and important different version, in the numbers, such as the formances of War Play, a Boston Musica Viva per sequence of authentic 'Farewell Song,' which formance} were ad hoc, were dropped by the documents from the and could be replaced by years 1917-18 was culled Group Theater, or which, projections, film epi li ke 'Song of the from political speeches, sodes, or indeed by newspaper items, adver Soldier's Mother' (Epi whatever was felt appro taph), remained in voice tisements, Wall Street re priate to the music and ports, and so forth-as a and-piano score. Apart the theme in any given from Christopher Shaw's thematically appropriate circumstances. scoring of 'Song of the substitute for the ele Soldier's Mother' and ments of dramatic moti ©1988 by David Drew one transposition (up vation provided by the wards by a half-tone for play. The documents .

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