Berlot Brecht?...?

Question

i am doing "Fear and misery of the third reich" for my A2 drama exam and i need to research brechts techniques and notes on the play but i am usless at the internet i cant find anything.....any one have ideas about good websites???.....

Answer 1

Try the International Brecht Society:
http://german.lss.wisc.edu/brecht/
Pardon me for saying so, but you misspelled his first name here (it's Bertolt)
that might be the cause for the Google search not revealing anything...

Answer 2

The main facet of Brecht's writing and direction was to 'alienate' the audience. So many playwrights and directors attempted to suck audiences in and make them forget that they were watching a play, which Brecht thought was an absurd idea.

By alienating the audience and reminding them that they were, in fact, watching a play, it was more possible to teach them something.

You've heard of 'the 4th wall' that seperates the actors from the audience, so that the audience can peer in on characters that do not know that they are being watched. In Brecht, there CANNOT be a 4th wall. The characters address the audience directly, they sing and dance to make the audience pay attention and get the POINT or message of the play.

Theatre developed a 4th wall mentality in the 19th century in Europe and the US as melodrama plays with tragic morals were en vogue. Brecht and other 20th Century playwrights brushed this aside for the more traditional and arguably more effective techniques of direct-address, audience-involved theatre.

For Brecht and his contemporaries, such as Beckett, theatre was not merely entertainment, but an extremely powerful social and political tool.

Brecht's most famous play "Mother Courage" about the Lutheran/Catholic/Scandinavian/German wars of the 17th century was recently produced in Central Park starring Meryl Streep, Kevin Klein and Austin Pendleton. It was as effective an anti-war play now as it was when it was written, and the audience was drastically moved.

Brecht may be one of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century or more, and if you are directing his work and it isn't didactic and fun, then you are doing it wrong.

Your actors need to feel pain, and enjoy it to do Brecht. If they aren't crying and laughing, then try another approach.

Good luck! Break a leg!