PERFORMANCE DRAWINGS A drawing by Robert Wilson for his production of The Threepenny Opera. Ink and watercolor on paper, 120 x 80. Photo: Courtesy Robert Wilson. Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 THE THREEPENNY OPERA Drawings Robert Wilson (Editor’s Note: This issue of PAJ inaugurates a new series, Performance Drawings, with the designs by Robert Wilson for his staging of the Brecht-Weill classic, The Threepenny Opera, which premiered on September 27, 2007, at the Berliner Ensemble, home of the original 1928 production. In future issues drawings from performance and visual arts, including forms of musical and dance notation, will be featured in special portfolios.) ith all of my work I see the stage abstractly. I start the sketches and drawings first. Once I know the space it is much easier for me to decide Wwhat to do in it. I made a decision at the beginning to have the stage space constructed with lines of light. There are only two lines in the world, a straight one and a curved one. The first scene is a series of circles fading in and out as in a carnival or fairground (curved lines). The final scene is framed by a draped red curtain (curved lines). All the other scenes are different compositions of straight lines. Either horizontal, perpendicular, or diagonal. The Peachum shop is a series or low screens with vertical and horizontal lines as if to suggest movable racks of clothes. There are seen from time to time in different configurations. Together they make a low horizontal line across the space. The stable is by contrast a high barn-like space, as if light was coming through the boards of a barn. Sometimes parts of the back wall of lights disappear and change the depth of the space. For the marriage scene and the love duet in the center section, a pyramid of vertical lines flies away to reveal a vast empty space of stars and moon. For the bordello I have a series of horizontal boards that are placed vertically on the stage floor from downstage to upstage. The boards are painted in red lacquer. In the back of the boards are red fluorescent tubes. For most of the scene the boards are not lit and appear to be black, seen in silhouette. Only at key moments, one brief time in the beginning with Jenny during a silent scream, they are lit red. At the end of the scene, before Mack the Knife is led off to prison, one can see him trapped by an avalanche of the red boards, the lowest one being downstage and the highest one being upstage high above his head. For the prison scenes I use very thin 32 PAJ 88 (2008), pp. 32–41. © 2008 Robert Wilson Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 vertical lines of neon light against the black backdrop. For the finale of the first half I use a black curtain that slowly flies up to reveal an open space. For the final scene I use a quotation of the gallows scene from the original 1928 production, with the original proportion of that production. At the final moment a theatrical cliché of a red curtain descends, closing the piece. Jacques Reynaud’s costumes are all black velvet with the exception of Mack the Knife who is seen in a matte decadent sequined suit, and Polly in the beginning in a white girlish dress. The silhouettes of the costumes are architecturally sculptured to reveal strong silhouettes. The make-up is very carefully rendered, always with strong black lines around the eyes so that the eyes read from the audience. The movements of the eyes are very carefully studied as a theatrical language like in the silent movies. WILSON / The Threepenny Opera 33 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 34 PAJ 88 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 WILSON / The Threepenny Opera 35 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 36 PAJ 88 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 WILSON / The Threepenny Opera 37 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 38 PAJ 88 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 WILSON / The Threepenny Opera 39 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 40 PAJ 88 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021 The Threepenny Opera Bertolt Brecht and composer Kurt Weill, in collaboration with translator Elisabeth Hauptmann Robert Wilson, direction, scenic and lighting design Jacques Reynaud, costumes Andreas Fuchs, lighting Serge von Arx, co-designer Ann-Christin Rommen, assistant director Drawings: Courtesy Robert Wilson Photos: Courtesy Lesley Leslie-Spinks Key to drawings: 1, 2. Pencil on paper, 170 x 240 3. Ink on paper, 120 x 80 4. Ink and watercolor on paper, 120 x 80 5. Pencil on paper, 120 x 80 6. Ink on paper, 120 x 80 7. Ink on paper, 170 x 240 ROBERT WILSON has been honored for his visionary work with the Golden Lion for sculpture from the Venice Biennale, the Dorothy and Lil- lian Gish Prize for Lifetime Achievement, the Premio Europa Award from Taormina Arte, a nomination for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama, the National Design Award for Lifetime Achievement, and as Commandeur dans l’Ordre des Arts et Lettres by the French government. For more than three decades he has created a new vocabulary for theatre and opera, starting with early pieces such as Deafman Glance, The Life and Times of Joseph Stalin, and Death Destruction and Detroit. His Einstein on the Beach, written with composer Philip Glass, is a landmark in twentieth-century opera. Wilson has also staged Parsifal, The Magic Flute, Madame Butterfly, and Lohengrin at La Scala, the Metropolitan Opera, and Opera Bastille. He has collaborated with many artists, including Heiner Müller, Allen Ginsberg, Lou Reed, Susan Sontag, Tom Waits, William Burroughs, and David Byrne, on numerous music and dramatic works for the stage, in addition to classic texts of Flaubert, Ibsen, Strindberg, and Gertrude Stein. His production of Fables de la Fontaine, with the Comédie Française, was recently seen at the Lincoln Center Festival 2007. Major exhibitions of his work have been shown at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; and the Instituto Valencia de Arte Moderno. WILSON / The Threepenny Opera 41 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/pajj.2008.30.1.31 by guest on 30 September 2021.