Lady in the Dark: Vergiss für einmal den Weltschmerz

The many selves of Liza Elliott: Lady in the Dark Act I
Photo © Staatstheater Mainz/Martina Pipprich

Matthias Fontheim, departing Intendant of Mainz's Staatstheater, has directed a production of Kurt Weill's effervescent 1941 satire, "Lady in the Dark," as an exuberant, celebratory sendoff. (If this season and what I've heard of past and future ones are anything to go by, the celebration is deserved.)  The fluid staging made admirable use of a turntable in portraying protagonist Liza Elliott's varied environments, real and imagined. The saturated color and lively stage pictures would have been aptly suited to an MGM extravaganza of the time of the piece's creation (synopsis and more here.) I very much enjoyed the evening; while the vogue for psychoanalysis dramas (cf. this and this) has dated, Weill's keen take on the pressures on women (and men) transgressing expected social and gender roles remains pointedly relevant. Mainz's production cheerfully suggests that our best hope lies in facing these problems without taking ourselves too seriously.

Weil alles so schlecht ist: Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny

Dancing in the storm: denial as utopia in Mahagonny
Photo © Lena Obst/Staatstheater Wiesbaden

On Thursday, I took myself to the Staatstheater Wiesbaden's current run of the Weill/Brecht Mahagonny. The house was far from full, which is a shame; the orchestra and singers gave  engaged performances in a smart, effective production by intendant Manfred Beilharz. The production supported the sly score and the quick succession of dramatic episodes. Use of space was generally good, although the apron on far side of the pit, whence newcomers to Mahagonny come and where some significant apostrophizing of the audience takes place, was invisible from most of the top balcony. Bernd Holzapfel's sets were minimalistic in the first half, allowing the broken-down car of the fugitives and, later, the green moon of Alabama to dominate the empty space where it is impossible to go forward, and the way of retreat is cut off. I liked the homage to the aesthetic of the early 30s in the art deco skyscrapers and the liner on which Jimmy seeks to leave. The glittering city of Mahagonny as it appears in the second half is dominated by a building which could be a stock exchange, a courthouse, a seat of government, or all three; its architecture is the neo-classicism favored by all expanding powers of the 20th century, and its motto is simply ¥€$. A central platform served as dining table, brothel, and boxing ring, and even as courtroom. Zsolt Hamar led the orchestra in possibly the best performance I've heard from them: lively, lascivious, insinuating, and attaining real gravitas and poignancy at crucial moments. There was dark humor in abundance, to be sure, but we were never allowed to pretend that this was not a devastatingly relevant parable, as powerful in the early 21st century as a cry of outrage and protest as it was as Cassandra-like prophecy in 1930.

Erst kommt das Fressen, dann kommt die Moral

G.W. Pabst's 1931 film "Die Dreigroschenoper" left both Brecht and Weill dissatisfied: the material of the 1928 work which so impressed Pabst is rearranged, modified, and abbreviated to create a film which is a fascinating work in its own right. Almost half of Weill's sly music is omitted, some out of concerns for narrative, some out of concerns about censorship. The Brechtian satire which left no area of society untouched is here given a more pointed focus. (As an interesting documentary on the Criterion DVD set explains, this is largely due to the intervention of Brecht himself, who wanted Pabst to film an entirely new treatment, not the play which had so impressed the film director.) The Act II finale ("Ihr Herrn...") appears over the opening credits, signaling the economic satire that continues in one of the first images of the film: a stockbroker's sign (Chief Offices: Wall Street) revealed over Mackie's shoulder as he sets off on the prowl, following two young ladies who have been indulging in the bourgeois pastime of window-shopping. Sexual mores are also an object of mockery; this is the London of Jack the Ripper, not John Gay, with women in long ruffled skirts, and men in bowlers. It is, however, sometimes difficult to remember that this is ostensibly the English capital, despite the mentions of Scotland Yard; this metropolis is so clearly the product of German Expressionism, close relative to the Berlin of Murnau's The Last Laugh, with narrow streets of impossible angles, a street singer (Ernst Busch) with posters resembling the work of Egon Schiele, and dance halls and deserted warehouses that might belong to the hidden corners of any early twentieth-century city.