Response Essay
“Theatre makes us think about power and the way our society works and it does this with a clear purpose, to make a change.”
The ideas of Bertolt Brecht (1898-1965) changed the theatre in many ways. Brecht along with Erwin Piscator developed the style of Epic theatre style contrasting to previous accepted styles. Presentational in form, Epic theatre is a vehicle for social comment through techniques such as: alienation, historification, eclectic influences (highly Asian), constructivism in scenery, disjointed and illogical scene placement, ordinary clothing and lighting, the use of music to detach the audience from emotion, placards and signs and projected images. Didactic in nature Brecht’s works aim to challenge the audience to assess socially accepted norms and educate them to injustices often overlooked by the public. The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Brecht, 1944) written during the time of Nazi Germany occupation has a clearly political and social focus.
The Caucasian Chalk Circle (CCC) is a play of two stories which eventually are interweaved. Scene 1 is a prologue to the action of the play that serves as a metaphor for the entire play “struggle between what is right legally and what right socially”. The protagonist from the first story is Grusha, a simple maid who sacrifices her safety and youth to protect Governor’s child. Scenes 2-4 focus exclusively on Grusha’s story. Scene 5 introduces the protagonist for the second story, the drunk judge Adzak. Scene 6 brings the two protagonists together and is the climatic action of the play. Scenes 5 and 6 focus more on social problems being that the base of society- the justice system. The audience experiences the drunken judge take bribes and rule in favour of thos...
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...onal connection. The Caucasian Chalk Circle by Bertolt Brecht is a perfect example of the conventions Epic theatre uses to alienate the audience form emotion connection in order to allow an objective viewing of the themes and issue presented. These being ones of social order: is the social structure and legal systems providing fair and just rulings and procedures? By examination of Post World War Two damages we see the effects of war then as a result consciously attempt to prevent it and change our situation. This is an effective way of challenging and informing the contemporary audience as it is visual and audibly dynamic as well as informative, the medium of live theatre is intense and it allows audience members to ascertain meaning together. This sparks discussion which will lead to the individual assessing and attempting to change the way in which society works.
Colette Conroy, senior lecturer of drama at University of Hull, in her work Theatre and the Body, discusses how the body is used within performance. Conroy focuses on four fundamental issues: bodies and meaning, bodies and power, bodies and mind, and bodies and culture. This paper will discuss bodies and meaning, power and culture in association with The Nether, Lysistrata, and Disgraced respectively. Conroy employs the works of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Timberlake Wertenbaker, Judith Baker, and many others to help discuss the purpose of human bodies within theatre.
Over the course of his career, Brecht developed the criteria for and conditions needed to create Epic Theatre. The role of the audience can be likened to that of a group of college aged students or intellectuals. Brecht believed in the intelligence of his audience, and their capacity for critical analysis. He detested the trance-like state that an Aristotelian performance can lure the audience into. Plays that idealize life and humanity are appealing to an audience, and this makes it easy for them to identify with the hero, they reach a state of self oblivion. The spectator becomes one with the actor, and experiences the same fantastical climax that is unattainable in real life.
Bertolt Brecht was a German playwright, theatre critic, and director. He created and developed epic theatre with the belief that theatre is not solely for entertainment but also tools for politics and social activism. Previous theatre performances offered a form of escapism. The audience would become emotionally invested in the performance. In contrast to the suspension of disbelief, Brecht never wanted the audience to fall into the performance. He wanted the audience to make judgments on the argument dealt in the play. The aim of epic theatre is to detach the audience from any emotional connection in order for them to critically review the story. The ultimate goal of this theatre is creating awareness of social surroundings and encouraging the audience to take initiative on changing the society.
The triviality of melodrama is so often the theatrical scapegoat that boils the blood of the modern-day critic: the sentimental monologues, the martyred young lovers, the triumphant hero, and the self-indulgent imagery. Melodrama would seem the ultimate taboo; another failed Shakespearean staging or even worse, an opera minus the pretty music. Ironically, Bertolt Brecht, dramatic revolutionary and cynic of all things contrived found promise in the melodramatic presentation. Brecht examined and manipulated the various superficial and spectacular aspects of theatre, establishing a synthesis of entertainment and social criticism as his fundamental goal. Bertolt Brecht employs various facets of melodramatic technique in The Jewish Wife, ultimately reconfiguring the genre and conveying his central theme; a society rendered immobile at the will of a totalitarian regime.
The Brechtian style of performance is a style of theater in which the audience is balanced between two modes of viewership. On the one hand the Brechtian style requires that the audience watch the show engaged emotionally, but not in the classic Aristotelian cathartic way. On the other hand it requires that the audience stay critically active in dealing with the performance, thus, achieving an alienated political and educational response among the members of the audience. Naturally this style of theater produces a conflict of interests in the direction of a show. Should the performance focus on garnering political influence and sway, or should the production be emotionally compelling and relatable, or perhaps a combination of both? In order
Brecht, Bertolt. Brecht on Theatre: The Development of an Aesthetic. Hill & Wang New York,
Russell Brown, J. 1995. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Theatre. 3rd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
My work proposes a broader view of the theatre-film interface, one that relies on intertextuality as its interpretive method. I believe it is valuable-both pedagogically and theoretically-to ask broad questions about the aesthetic, narrative, and ideological exchanges between the history of theatre and contemporary film and television. For example, this paper will study how the "Chinese Restaurant" episode of the sitcom, Seinfeld, intertextually reworks Samuel Beckett's modernist play, Waiting for Godot. In each text, characters encounter an existential plight as they are forced to wait interminably, and thus confront their powerlessness at the hands of larger social forces. As a pedagogical matter, this connection encourages the students to see academic culture in the guise of having to read Beckett's play for my course, not as foreign and alienating, but instead as continuous with their understanding of leisure activities like watching sitcoms. As a theoretical matter, this intertextual connection allows important ideological matters to come into bold relie...
...pressing of emotions, identifying with other systems of thought. Theatrical arts have managed to transcend ethical issues, racial differences, and many other facets of discourse in society. If theatre is indeed an engine for social change it should not be held from the people who need it the most. Those who are incarcerated. Programs across the nation have already started to see success in the prisons they operate in, so to think about the effect that theatre in prison would have on a nationwide scale is indeed a beautiful thought. If theatre programs in prison would be funded by the states or nationally, potentially the idea of professional prison playhouses could become a reality, and the world would be introduced into a new era of art that is truly a beautiful thing to behold. Shakespeare writes in Hamlet, “We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”
Societies progress can lead to intercultural similarities, and vastily obvious differences. These influences can be seen within the contemporary theatre of the times, explaining and progressing the status of community through storytelling and performance. The reactions to these changes are important, and help shape the society we have today. These elements are best seen between the medieval ans renaissance period.
Brechtian theatre, also known as epic theatre, strives to keep the audience members objective and prevents
In this paper, I will be focusing briefly on my knowledge and understanding of the concept of Applied theatre and one of its theatre form, which is Theatre in Education. The term Applied Theatre is a broad range of dramatic activity carried out by a crowd of diverse bodies and groups.
The survival of theatre lies in the very nature of humankind: its inner voyeuristic drive. The desire to watch other people dealing with their conflicts and fates challenges as well as reinforces values and the morality of society. The theatre provides an exciting opportunity to watch stories and situations as if they were real life, showing us the truth of our nature.
For thousands of years, people have been arguing that theatre is a dying art form. Many people think theatre is all just cheesy singing and dancing or just boring old Shakespeare, but there is much more to theatre than those two extremes. Theatre is important to our society because it teaches us more about real life than recorded media. Theatre has been around for thousands of years and began as a religious ceremony that evolved into an art form that teaches about the true essence of life. Theatre can incorporate profound, and provocative, observations of the human condition that can transcend time; lessons found in Greek plays can still be relevant to the modern world. People argue that the very essence of theatre is being snuffed out by modern
If we see the irony here as present but not totally corrosive, then by bringing us such a reconciliation, theatre (Prospero's experiment in the play and The Tempest itself) can help to maintain our best hopes for a meaningful life, faith that in time we will work things out, that, in spite of evil, the end of our story will manifest a pattern of moral significance. Locked into the contingencies of history in our political and business lives, where competition and deceitful self-interest hold sway, we may easily lose this faith. The theatre is, in a sense, a place which can restore us.