By Bertolt Brecht Translated by David Hare
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By Bertolt Brecht Translated by David Hare Theatre at UBC Presents By Bertolt Brecht Translated by David Hare March 8 to 17, 2007 Frederic Wood Theatre Directed by Camyar Chai Set Design by Rachel E. Stanners Lighting Design by Chris Littman Costume Design by Alison Green & Mavis Lui Original Songs & Sound Design by Patrick Pennefather BERTOLT BRECHT a biography read Das Kapital and befriended Later, in Switzerland where Moth- Karl Korsch, a prominent Commu- er Courage had premiered in 1941, The first child of Friedrich Brecht, nist thinker and theoretician who he resumed his work, setting down chief clerk in a paper factory, and taught him the essential principles his thoughts, observations and Wilhelmine Friederike Sophie of Marxism. theories in A Short Organum for Brezing, the daughter of a civil the Theatre, which influenced the- servant, Eugen Berthold Friedrich The burning of the Reichstag took atremakers all over the world. Brecht was born on February 10, place on February 27, 1933. The 1898 in the medieval city of Augs- next day, Brecht and his family In 1948, having been refused entry burg, Germany. A sickly child with fled to Vienna and later Denmark. into the American zone of occupied a congenital heart condition, he The Nazis revoked his German Germany, Brecht and Weigel went suffered a heart attack at age 12. citizenship in 1935 and burned his to the Soviet sector of Berlin. On He soon recovered and continued books. January 11, 1949, he directed his his Latin, history and humanities own production of Mother Courage education in private school, where Fearing mounting pressure on at the Deutsches Theatre with He- he co-founded and co-edited a mag- Denmark to extradite him to Ger- lene Weigel in the title role. With azine. By age 16, Brecht was writ- many, Brecht moved to Sweden the establishment of his own com- ing for a local newspaper and had in 1939. When the Nazis invaded pany, the Berliner Ensemble, in completed the first of his forty plays. Poland, he abandoned his work 1949, Brecht’s theatrical future on The Good Woman of Setzuan was secured with full support from Brecht’s political thinking was al- to write Mother Courage, his re- the Communist regime. ready well-established by the time sponse to the rise of fascism and the First World War broke out. the threat of a second world war. With the Berliner Ensemble, While in high school, he was al- Brecht was able to put into prac- most expelled for expressing paci- To further distance themselves tice his “epic theatre” techniques ficist views in an essay about not from the encroaching war, the Bre- which distinguished the compa- defending his country in wartime. cht family fled to Finland in 1940, ny’s dynamic theatrical approach At 19, he was drafted and placed and the following year traveled, with often-innovative stagings of as a medical orderly in an emer- via Moscow and Vladivostok, to contemporary and classical plays, gency hospital. Deeply affected by San Pedro, California. Brecht was including Shakespeare, where un- what he witnessed there, he wrote unsuccessful in finding work in derlying themes of social and class Legend of the Dead Soldier, an Los Angeles, writing in his diary, conflict could be emphasized. anti-war ballad that the Nazi re- “For the first time in ten years, I am gime would later cite as the reason not working seriously on anything.” Brecht died of a heart attack on Au- to deprive him of his citizenship. gust 14, 1956 while working on a Nevertheless, in the six years Bre- response to Samuel Beckett’s Wait- While studying medicine and sci- cht lived in Hollywood, he wrote ing for Godot. He was buried, as he ence at the Universität in Munich the screenplay for Hangmen Also had requested, in the old Huguenot in 1917, he attended seminars on Die for director Fritz Lang, and cemetery beneath the window of his the theatre, started to write a new the plays The Visions of Simone last apartment in Berlin. play, Baal, and found work as a Machard and The Caucasian theatre critic for a local newspaper. Chalk Circle. He also collaborated By 1921 he had become a serious on a Beverly Hills production of 01 Bertolt Brecht writer, penning poems, ballads, Galileo with Charles Laughton, 02 Helene Weigel, as Anna Fierling, in Mother Courage short stories, one-act and full- which was slated for Broadway. and her Children length plays, and also had begun directing. In 1922 his play Drums Brecht was called before the House in the Night opened at Kammer- Un-American Activities Com- spiele Theatre, turning Brecht into mittee in October 1947 to testify an overnight success. He won the on his “subversion” of Hollywood prestigious Kleist Prize and be- and Communist infiltration of the came a dramaturg for the theatre. movie industry. Managing to evade In 1923, his plays Jungle of the Cit- answering the Committee’s ques- ies and Baal were both produced. tions, he left the United States the following day for Paris where he After moving to Berlin in 1924, told a friend, “When they accused Brecht worked as a dramaturg for me of wanting to steal the Empire Max Reinhardt’s Deutsches The- State Building, I thought it was atre. By the late 1920s, Brecht had high time for me to leave.” 01 02 SIR DAVID HARE Playwright Sir David Hare was Plays he has adapted Pirandello’s Awards include the BAFTA Award born in Bexhill, East Sussex, Eng- The Rules of the Game, Brecht’s (1979), the New York Drama Crit- land on 5 June 1947, and was edu- Galileo and Chekhov’s Ivanov ics Circle Award (1983), the Berlin cated at Lancing College and Jesus and Platonov. He also adapted Film Festival Golden Bear (1985), College, Cambridge. He co-founded Schnitzler’s La Ronde into The the Olivier Award (1990), and the Portable Theatre Company, acting, Blue Room. David Hare’s films for London Theatre Critics’ Award directing and writing plays. Slag BBC television are Licking Hitler, (1990). In 1998 David Hare was was first produced in London in Dreams of Hitler, Heading Home given a knighthood for services to 1970 at the Hampstead Theatre and The Absence of War. He also the theatre. Club. He was Resident Dramatist wrote Saigon: Year of the Cat for at the Royal Court Theatre in Lon- Thames Television. Sir David Hare lives in London. don in 1970-1 and Resident Drama- tist at the Nottingham Playhouse His recent plays Via Dolorosa (a in 1973. He co-founded Joint Stock one man show that Hare performs) Theatre Group with David Aukin and Stuff Happens are a sharp in- and Max Stafford-Clark in 1975. vestigation into the morality of in- He has been Associate Director of ternational intervention and how the National Theatre since 1984. the war in Iraq impacts the lives of citizens in Britain and America. Over his 35-year career, David Hare has written twenty-five plays Feature film screenplays include for the stage and thirteen origi- Wetherby, Plenty, Paris by Night, nal screenplays for cinema and Strapless, Damage, The Secret television. His plays include Slag, Rapture, Via Dolorosa (also acted) The Great Exhibition, Brassneck, and The Hours. He also directed Knuckle, Teeth ‘N Smiles, The Ju- The Designated Mourner and has das Kiss, Plenty, The Secret Rap- written the books Writing Left- ture, A Map of the World, Skylight, Handed, Asking Around, Acting Amy’s View, My Zinc Bed, Pravda Up and Obedience, Struggle and (with Howard Brenton), The Perma- Revolt. nent Way and The Breath of Life. 01 Sir David Hare 02 Jacques Callot (1592-1635), The Miseries of War (detail) 01 02 Verfremdungseffekt: Brecht’s intention was to set the audience apart simple props and scenery. For instance, a single tree would be used to from familiar situations so that they may think about them objectively convey a whole forest, and the stage is often flooded with bright white light whether it’s a winter’s night or a summer’s day. Several songs are used to Mother Courage and her Children demonstrates Brecht’s concepts underscore the themes of the play. of Epic Theatre and Verfremdungseffekt or “alienation”. “Alienation”, however, is something of a misleading translation, for it suggests that The action of the play takes place over the course of 12 years (1624-1636) the audience is actively cut off from the performance. A more accurate represented in 12 short scenes. One is given a sense of Courage’s career translation of Verfremdungseffekt is “distancing effect” or “to make without being given enough time to develop sentimental feelings and empa- strange”, since Brecht’s intention was to set the audience apart from thize with any of the characters. Meanwhile, Mother Courage is not depicted familiar situations so that they may think about them objectively. as a noble character—here the Brechtian epic theatre sets itself apart from the ancient Greek tragedies in which the heroes are far above the average. In Brecht’s staging of the play Verfremdungseffekt was achieved through With the same alienating effect, the ending of Brecht’s play does not arouse the use of placards which reveal the events of each scene, juxtaposition, our desire to imitate the main character, Mother Courage. actors changing characters and costume on stage, the use of narration, CAST Anna Fierling Lois Anderson* Young Kattrin Anouska Anderson Kirby Kattrin/Singing Voice Courtney Lancaster Eiliff Ira Cooper Swiss Cheese Spencer Atkinson Cook Evan Frayne Chaplain Nick Fontaine Yvette Joanna Rannelli Recruiting Officer/Young Soldier/2nd Soldier Aslam Husain Sergeant/Fur Coat/Young Man/Lieutenant Shaun Aquiline Commander-In-Chief/Old Soldier/ Gord Myren Singing Soldier/Soldier/Voice Sergeant/Armourer/2nd Soldier/Voice/Soldier Kevin Kraussler Mercenary 1/Peasant/Servant/1st Soldier Will Goldbloom Soldier/Peasant/Soldier with Gun Max Gilbert Mercenary 2/Old Woman/Voices/Peasant Son Kim Harvey Man with Patch/Farmer’s Wife/Voices/Peasant Wife Maura Halloran Regimental Clerk/Voices Hilary Fillier Old Colonel Carlos Yamini Peasant Don Griffiths MOTHER COURAGE AND HER CHILDREN runs 2 hours, 35 minutes including one fifteen-minute intermission.