Word: brecht
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...ideal. The singers perform zestfully, even when Sellars requires the principals to sing lying on the floor, as if they were practicing some new kind of aerobic exercise for the vocal cords. Instead of reinforcing the staging, or indeed placing it in the kind of paradoxical context limned by Brecht and Weill, this straightforward musicality puts the brakes on the rambunctious staging. The rhythms of the songs and the pace of the action are too different, which may be why the single most successful moment of the production is the overture, staged in front of a scrim decorated with...
...Brecht's theory, which he called "Epic" theater, involves incorporating the audience into the production by leaving them somewhat detached and thus more capable of learning a lesson from the play. The Brechtian audience ideally should leave the theater saying not, "Wow, that was a moving play," but rather. "I have never thought about them that was before" Brecht armed to achieve this effect by alternating his audience through stage techniques like pantomime, signboards which reveal the plot prematurely and thus kill the suspense and often through peculiar Kurt Wcill songs steamy or jazzy cabaret numbers about the most serious...
Mother Courage is a demanding play to yet another degree. For this is the play that got away from Brecht the play that unlike The Threepennv Opera Or The Good-Women of Setzuan, transcended Brecht's theories of theater and look on a life of its own. The final scene in which Mother Courage's mute daughter climbs to a rooftop and beats a drum to warn a nearly town of the approaching enemy can be one of the most moving scenes in post-modern drama. Because of its emotional force it almost disproves its creator's theories In that...
...underestimates the intricacy of this particular Brechtian work. The HRDC's Mother Courage succeeds on the first levels it incorporates all of the Brechtian techniques of alienation and it leaves the audience feeling detached and thoughtful. However it does not succeed on that more tenuous level of which Brecht would probably disapprove--it is not haunting...
...while avoiding the usual pitfalls, this production falls instead into the Brechtian chasm. Were it any other play by Bertolt Brecht, this director and this cast could have produced something special. One can't fault them for choosing a hard nut to crack, and indeed, the play might shine with some more polishing. In any case, such a talented director and superb cast deserve a look...