Word: brecht
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Brecht's Galileo, the modern concerns are there. References to the starving Italian peasantry make clear Brecht's political leanings, and in emphasizing the possible dangers of scientific inquiry, he invokes the Einstein/Oppenheimer dilemma. But these issues have too little to do with the progress of the play to hold it together. The political speeches seem like incidental inserts, and by the end of the play Brecht seems to have dropped the issue of science's dangers in his concern with Galileo's integrity...
Theoretically, our sympathy with the characters could produce a certain amount of dramatic tension even though we already know the final outcome. Unfortunately, the Loeb production lacks even that tension. Part of the failure can be blamed on Brecht's dialogue, which has a stiffness that marks his characters as unreal figures, as mere vehicles for statements. To a large extent, however, the fault lies with the uneven acting. George Hamlin, as Galileo, has a powerful, expressive voice, but he seems to have trouble remembering his lines. Some of his slips and stammers fit in with the image...
...description of a telescope, for example, Galileo immediately constructs his own telescope out of two lenses, two breakfast buns, and an old book. Most of the experiments he conducts are embarrassing in their inanity. Just because he is dealing with the infancy of empirical science is no reason for Brecht to reduce science to an infantile level. The proof that this is unnecessary comes as early as the first scene, when Galileo explains his theories to the young Andrea. Perhaps because he is speaking are truly imaginative, the excitement of scientific discovery is more believable here than in any later...
...JEWISH WIFE/I CAME INTO THE WORLD, by Brecht (maybe he's ubiquitous too) and Handke, respectively. Some friends of mine from SUNY saw it last week and claimed it's terrific. But they sounded bored. Tomorrow and Saturday only, 8:30 at 1151 Mass...
...COME DOWN. A Folk Rock Story of the Life of Jesus of Nazareth. He was honester than Brecht: he just refrained from answering. Tomorrow night only, 8 p.m. in Payne Hall...