It is noted in many books that near the start of his career, Peter Brook was attracted to both plays and techniques that expressed human contradiction. He often wondered, though, whether there were any modern playwrights who could possibly equal the richness and complexity of Shakespearean verse, and often complained about the improbability of ever finding material to work on or to produce as stimulating as that of Shakespeare. When, in 1964, Brook received a play entitled The Persecution and Assassination of Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade (Marat/Sade), by German playwright Peter Weiss, it is also noted that Brook felt he had finally encountered the challenge of Shakespearean theater he was looking for. Not only was Marat/Sade an incredibly well written and unique approach to theater as a whole, its incorporation of music and movement, song and montage, and naturalism and surrealism within the text created the perfect passage, for Brook, from his commercial past to his experimental present, as well as a way for both the playwright and the director to deal with the concept of theater as therapy; a rather ironic, yet at the same time clever, idea seeing as how the play itself is conducted within the confines of an asylum, with the inmates themselves as the stars. One of the most complex aspects of presenting Marat/Sade was its large and eclectic cast of characters and also its incorporation of a play within a play. On stage, these points were, looking at the opinions of a majority of both the audiences and the critics, presented successfully by Brook and the cast he worked with. From the prison guards who loomed in the background, clothed in butcher aprons and armed with clubs, to the half-naked Marat, slouched in a tub and covered in wet rags, forever scratching and writing, to the small group of singers, dressed and painted up as clowns, to the narcoleptic but murderous Charlotte Corday, Weiss and Brook offered a stage production that both engaged and amazed the audience, while at the same time forced them to question their role as the audience; no better exemplified than at the very end of the play, where the inmates, standing menacingly at the edge of the stage, actually begin to applaud the very people who applaud their performance, aggravating and confusing some, but forcing most t...
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...m, though they are quite safe behind a large facade of iron bars. This technique corresponds to the menacing way that the characters address the camera throughout the performance, and creates the necessary feeling, for the viewers, that no such barrier is available to protect them as they are drawn in uncomfortably closer to the inmates by Brook’s camerawork. We begin to question whether or not the soliloquies, spoken directly into the camera instead of to the protected aristocrats who originally played our ‘part’ of the audience, are still merely just a theater convention, or if the insanity of the performers is used as a catalyst for we, ourselves, to feel threatened directly by what is spoken. We also begin to question whether or not the inmate is even looking at the camera to address the audience, or is simply insane, and addressing the air around them, adding yet another layer to such complex characters. Creating such questions within the audience’s mind also seems to create, for most, the aura of discomfort and skepticism that Brook was aiming to achieve, and reached quite successfully.
Bibliography
Lunatics, Lovers, and Poets by Margaret Croyden
The characters address the audience; the fast movement from scene to scene juxtaposing past and present and prevents us from identifying with particular characters, forcing us to assess their points of view; there are few characters who fail to repel us, as they display truly human complexity and fallibility. That fallibility is usually associated with greed and a ruthless disregard for the needs of others. Emotional needs are rarely acknowledged by those most concerned with taking what they maintain is theirs, and this confusion of feeling and finance contributes to the play's ultimate bleak mood.
The play moves in an increasingly intense montage of scenes that lead up to the conviction of nine Order members. A little research informs that many of the members portrayed in the play are still serving jail sentences today. Considering the play was not easy to watch, it must have been just as difficult to perform. Go...
... to those viewing the performance. The audience must focus their attention of the happenings and the words being portrayed on stage or screen or they will easily miss the double meaning Stoppard intended in each scene of the play. The human motivation is inseparably connected with the theme of life and death that runs through the play, for it is as the two are about to die that they observe that maybe they could have made a different decision, one that would let them remain alive and free they only missed their opportunity to make that choice. Stoppard wanted his play to express more meaning and different messages to his audience but he desired for them to search the play and pay close attention to the different meanings present so they could gain the most possible from the play and those who did not understand would walk away not understanding how much they missed.
Sometimes, cuts in a play obey to reasons regarding the stage capacity, or your budget. In the essay, we will choose our cuts based on the play only, as we consider it an interesting exercise that will surely help us understanding the play. We decided to read the play a couple of times, highlighting the elements we could cut, and after thinking carefully, these are the parts we would cut. We intended to keep it short, as not to alter the meaning of the play, or hinder any part of the plot, we focused on trimming parts that would not necessarily add up to the plot, but instead, are there to show the human parts of the play, these parts are important in their own right, of course, but in our cut, we focused on the plot, excuse us beforehand if we are too severe, and cut some parts we should have
Throughout the piece, we see the use of audience as active participants to amplify the didactic message of the play. In the literature we see many instances where the author uses this cognitive distancing as a way to disrupt the stage illusion and make the audience active members of the play. Forcing the audience into an analytical standpoint as opposed to passively accepting whats happening in their conscious minds. This occurs time and time again in the fourth act of the play. The characters repeatedly break down the fourth wall and engage the audience with open participation. We see this in the quotation from the end of the fourth Act of the play:
Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night is a comedy that has been interpreted in different ways, enabling one to receive multiple experiences of the same story. Due to the content and themes of the play, it can be creatively challenging to producers and their casting strategies. Instead of being a hindrance, I find the ability for one to experiment exciting as people try to discover strategies that best represent entertainment for the audience, as well as the best ways to interpret Shakespeare’s work.
opinions in Act 1, Scene 2. The aim of this is to build the suspense
Joseph, Bertram. Rev. of The Twelfth Night of Shakespeare’s Audience, by John W. Draper. Review of English Studies 3.10 (1952): 170-71. Print.
"Elizabethan Theatre Audiences." Elizabethan Theatre Audiences. Strayer University, 16 May 2012. Web. 24 Mar. 2014.
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.
In Act 1, “ Voices can be heard,” Winn shows how these girls express themselves through theatre and can act out different kinds of stories about their lives and the lives they aspire to have. She also proposes that the youth need to be heard in order to find their way in life. Winn explains “ this act will explore theories of play in order to understand its critical role in the lives of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated girls” (P.17). With this in mind, it is clear from the play that each one of these women's performances reflects their deepest desires for life out of jail. Also, it demonstrates how aware they are of why they ended up there, including the social issues and cultural influences that led them to their
Brecht argues that the ultimate purpose of play is to induce pleasure and to entertain, and that--because of this purpose--play needs no justification. Plays should not be simply copied from or seen through older performances, but need to develop on their own to better relate to a new audience. Through the use of alienation which aims to make the familiar unfamiliar, play and theatre can be seen under a new perspective, and the actor can feel more free to perform under a new guise.
In a recent performance of the two-man murder mystery at the Geffen playhouse entitled, Murder For Two, the show actively breaks the illusion of the fourth wall by addressing the audience throughout the performance. For example, one of the two actors, who plays multiple characters, breaks character and the fourth wall in order to address the audience when sound effects for a ringing phone are played. In the plays world, its simply the phone of the second actor’s character who is trying to receive a phone call to advance the plot, but in the audience’s world for a split second it seems like the noise is embarrassingly coming from a member of the house. This created some of the funniest moments of the show because of how separate the moment was from the play’s reality. It had such an effective response from the audience simply put, because it was more poignant about the world’s infatuation with cell phone usage than the content of the play, which was purposefully implausible and unbelievable. A choice like this could not be made without directly addressing the audience’s world politically; otherwise it simply would not get a laugh. Whether or not the audience continues to use their phone in public places, the audience, in that moment, took a critical look at their societal state and laughed at it. True Brechtian Theater encapsulates all genres and emotions with the political and
This passage tears at my very soul!!! This play was to me a biting farce written to satisfy a bloody crowd.
Two characters that express themselves differently but, through their use of disguise and similar affect on the audience, manage to successfully portray the depth of a drama by connecting with the audience and acting as a channel for the cathartic moment, which marks a drama. These two women represent the same character but portray her in different ways. Viola’s portrayal is directed toward the fantastical, comedic setting of Twelfth Night, whereas Blanche is a much harsher, real, relatable character where the true fight with these emotion can be felt in an authentic way.