Newport
2006-04-19 09:32:03 UTC
by JIM BECKERMAN
The new production of "The Threepenny Opera" opens at Studio 54 on
Thursday.
Wallace Shawn, the newest translator thinks his version, at least, has
the right degree of attitude. "Brecht is not at all cute," Shawn says.
"He's a nasty guy."
Translating "Threepenny Opera," one of the touchstones of 20th-century
theater, has become a kind of hobby for literary people since 1954, when
the original off-Broadway production made a hit out of "Mack the Knife."
No fewer than four major translations have been done since then -- each
claiming to more aptly render the cynical flavor of Brecht and Kurt
Weill's 1928 musical satire about the beggars, thieves and prostitutes
of the 19th-century London underworld.
The new version by the Roundabout Theatre features a highly eclectic
gallery of players: pop star Cindi Lauper, Alan Cumming from "Cabaret,"
Broadway veteran Jim Dale, "Saturday Night Live's" Ana Gasteyer and
cross-dresser Brian Charles Rooney (who does a fully frontal nude
scene). It also features a new, punk-chic look that is a cross between
"A Clockwork Orange" and the leather bar in "The Sopranos."
What with intimations of bisexuality, Goth costumes, neon signs that
ascend and descend, a gender-bending coloratura aria and Lauper in a
Bride of Frankenstein hairdo, the lyrics may be the last thing on some
viewers' minds. But there are theater people who grew up with the 1954
cast album with Lotte Lenya, not to mention the hit "Mack the Knifes" of
Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra and Bobby Darin, who will never quite get
used to any other lyrics. Those 1954 lyrics were by Marc Blitzstein,
himself a celebrated theater composer ("The Cradle Will Rock"), and were
considered edgy in their day.
But that day was the 1950s, when the full savagery of "Threepenny" had
to be muted for the McCarthy era. Brecht's play, based on John Gay's
classic 1728 satire "The Beggar's Opera," is a carpet-bombing attack on
the middle class: Brecht's thieves and prostitutes are meant to be the
mirror image of capitalists. "What is the robbing of a bank compared to
the founding of a bank?" Macheath says.
Revivals, including a 1976 Public Theater production with Raul Julia and
a 1989 Broadway version starring Sting, used newer, ruder translations
in an attempt to achieve the "alienation effect" Brecht wanted. Who
wouldn't want to be part of a "Threepenny" revival during the Bush era,
when war and unbridled capitalism are the topics of the hour? No musical
show could possibly be more relevant to 2006, Shawn says. "This is a
time when that kind of anger and nastiness is very appropriate."
The new production of "The Threepenny Opera" opens at Studio 54 on
Thursday.
Wallace Shawn, the newest translator thinks his version, at least, has
the right degree of attitude. "Brecht is not at all cute," Shawn says.
"He's a nasty guy."
Translating "Threepenny Opera," one of the touchstones of 20th-century
theater, has become a kind of hobby for literary people since 1954, when
the original off-Broadway production made a hit out of "Mack the Knife."
No fewer than four major translations have been done since then -- each
claiming to more aptly render the cynical flavor of Brecht and Kurt
Weill's 1928 musical satire about the beggars, thieves and prostitutes
of the 19th-century London underworld.
The new version by the Roundabout Theatre features a highly eclectic
gallery of players: pop star Cindi Lauper, Alan Cumming from "Cabaret,"
Broadway veteran Jim Dale, "Saturday Night Live's" Ana Gasteyer and
cross-dresser Brian Charles Rooney (who does a fully frontal nude
scene). It also features a new, punk-chic look that is a cross between
"A Clockwork Orange" and the leather bar in "The Sopranos."
What with intimations of bisexuality, Goth costumes, neon signs that
ascend and descend, a gender-bending coloratura aria and Lauper in a
Bride of Frankenstein hairdo, the lyrics may be the last thing on some
viewers' minds. But there are theater people who grew up with the 1954
cast album with Lotte Lenya, not to mention the hit "Mack the Knifes" of
Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra and Bobby Darin, who will never quite get
used to any other lyrics. Those 1954 lyrics were by Marc Blitzstein,
himself a celebrated theater composer ("The Cradle Will Rock"), and were
considered edgy in their day.
But that day was the 1950s, when the full savagery of "Threepenny" had
to be muted for the McCarthy era. Brecht's play, based on John Gay's
classic 1728 satire "The Beggar's Opera," is a carpet-bombing attack on
the middle class: Brecht's thieves and prostitutes are meant to be the
mirror image of capitalists. "What is the robbing of a bank compared to
the founding of a bank?" Macheath says.
Revivals, including a 1976 Public Theater production with Raul Julia and
a 1989 Broadway version starring Sting, used newer, ruder translations
in an attempt to achieve the "alienation effect" Brecht wanted. Who
wouldn't want to be part of a "Threepenny" revival during the Bush era,
when war and unbridled capitalism are the topics of the hour? No musical
show could possibly be more relevant to 2006, Shawn says. "This is a
time when that kind of anger and nastiness is very appropriate."