Trivium Foundational Knowledge (Grammar) Organiser Brecht Organising Principle: A Theatre Fit for the Scientific Age Influenced by: Theories and Techniques: Set Design: Dialectic: Erwin Piscator’s Epic Theatre Verfremdungseffekte/Alienation Effect (V/ Caspar Neher - Set Designer Set up in opposition to ‘Aristotelean Karl Marx’s Philosophy A)- De-familiarisation. ‘Dramatic’ Theatre’ Buchner’s Woyzeck Episodic Narrative - Framed Moments. - unfinished set, placards, projections… Bourgeois theatre vs Proletarian theatre German Expressionism Juxtaposition. - realistic stage properties, distressed, Contrast with Stanislavski (and Artaud) Mei Lan(fang) (Chinese theatre) Montage ‘authentic’. Characters often seen Anti_realism ‘Glass Wall’ ‘working/doing’… Influence on: Acting with two faces. Costumes: Lukacs opposes Brecht’s (and others) Anti- Joan Littlewood Acting in quotation marks. -Archetypical Realism and puts up a strong Marxist case David Edgar Narrator. Or authentic/distressed/worn/ for Realism and the tradition. Augusto Boal The Half Curtain. Pina Bausch Baring the device. Actors get into costumes on stage/apply Eugene Ionesco called Brecht a ‘postman’ Complicité Placards makeup because he was ‘always delivering messages’. Major Theories: Breaking the Fourth Wall. Lighting: Brecht has since been attacked for his The Street Scene Fixing the Not… But… Harsh White Light treatment of collaborators and his lovers. Lehrstücke (Learning Plays) Contradictions Audience lights on Epic Theatre Silent Scream (Oxymoronic formulations) (3p Opera - use of ‘cabaret lights’) Rumoured that his collaborator Elizabeth Dialectical Theatre Spectator as observer Music: (major collaborator: Kurt Weill) Hauptman wrote half of Mahagonny - but Smokers’ Theatre Social Gestus Musicians on stage. Songs commenting got no credit. The Boxing Ring - Sport analogy Spaß on action and separate from story Major pieces of work: Quotes: Bio: Rhetoric: Baal “Art is not a mirror held up to reality Born in 1898 in Augsburg, Germany. Essay: “What did Brecht mean by a Threepenny Opera but a hammer with which to shape it.” Medical orderly during first world war - ‘Theatre Fit for the Scientific Age’ and was Man is Man Audience “hang up their brains with their deeply affected. he successful in his aim?” 2000 words Fear and Misery in the Third Reich hats in the cloakroom.” Fled Germany when Nazis came to power. “Street Scene” improvisation Caucasian Chalk Circle “What is the robbing of a bank compared Became ‘stateless’ and in exile. Performance: Extracts from plays. Mother Courage to the founding of a bank?” (3p Opera) In USA was put in front of the ‘House Un- Further Reading: Galileo “If in art an appeal is made to the emotions American Activities Committee’ where he Brecht Toolkit: Stephen Unwin Good Person of Szechuan it means reason has to be switched off.” denied being a communist. Brecht on Theatre: Brecht Arturo Ui Returned to East Germany after war and Understanding Brecht: Walter Benjamin See also his poems ran ‘Berliner Ensemble’ Messingkauf Dialogues: Brecht Died 1956. (Buried with stiletto in his heart) [@Trivium21c 2018] .