Blown Away by Brecht: RC Theater’s Epic Undertaking

Written By Anthony Ratledge ‘17

Shannon Baskin ‘18 as the Recruiter, Samuel Sun ‘17 as the Sergeant, Lucy Kindstrand ‘17 as Mother Courage, Bentley Kennedy-Stone ‘16 as Swiss Cheese, Sonja Cirilo ‘15 as Kattrin, and Justin Baker ‘15 as Eilif discuss the nature of war at the start of Brecht’s Mother Courage.  
All Photos courtesy of Phuong Tran ’15

This would typically be the segment of the newspaper where I would give you a detailed account of the Randolph Fall Play production and critique it. For any typical review, this would suffice, but Randolph has not undertaken just any typical play. Director Brooke Edwards provided the Randolph Campus with a production of Mother Courage and Her Children over two weekends: November 14-16 and 21-23. The play was written in 1938 by Bertolt Brecht, who was not a proponent for traditional theatre. In reverence to this, I will not deliver a traditional review.

Part I: Background

Brecht wrote Mother Courage and Her Children, arguably his most famous play, in 1938 in direct response to what was happening in Germany during the rise of Nazism. Brecht was a Marxist and was concerned with the harshest realities of capitalism and war—and, in particular, the tainted relationship between the two.

Mother Courage, for example, derives her livelihood benefitting from the war, and throughout the play, she fears peace as it means her canteen wagon will have no viable business. She profits from the war, seemingly the way any capitalist enterprise would throughout history. She is only so named because she is courageous where there is money to be made.

Brecht’s goal is to make the audience “think, not feel.” He specifically alienates the audience to accomplish this through his idea of epic theatre, emphasizing presentation. For example, while the play specifically applies to the Thirty Years’ War, a series of Protestant uprisings against the Holy Roman Empire in the 17th century, the Randolph set and costumes were designed in order to incorporate elements of wars throughout history and from various countries. This choice was an artistic liberty taken by the RC Theatre Department and served to alienate by making the artificiality of the play visible to the audience. They pursued Brecht’s ideas about epic theatre—that “[a]rt  is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it,”—and tried to do just that.

Part II: Casting

Swiss Cheese (Bentley Kennedy-Stone ‘16) 
comforts his sister Kattrin (Sonja Cirilo ‘15) as he departs to hide the Protestants’
regimental cash box from the approaching Catholic army—an honest action
which leads to his death. 

Randolph graced us with the performances of Lucy Kindstrand ’17 as Mother Courage, Sonja Cirilo ’15 as her daughter Kattrin, Justin Baker ’15 and Bentley Kennedy-Stone ’16 as her sons Eilif and Swiss Cheese respectively, as well as Karl Mehler ’17 as the Chaplain and Sandeep Poudyal ’16 as the Cook, to name a few, as well as specifically adding the role of a narrator, played by John (JP) Davis ’17. In this play, the role of the narrator was grandiose. He approached from behind a screen at various points between scenes to interrupt the action and tell the audience precisely what was happening and what was going to happen. In addition, other cast members played multiple characters, which served to remind the audience that it was indeed watching a play. It seemed that the costumes made the characters, especially for some of the female actresses who played men in one scene and were threatened to be punched in the puss (meaning face), only to then dawn a new outfit and play women for a later scene.

Part III: The Undertaking

At any point when it became possible for an audience member to invest in the action as it unfolded, he or she was aptly reminded of the fictitious nature of the play by some grand gesture a member of the cast made. For example, cast member Poudyal has a heavy Nepali accent, and he played the Dutch Cook, whose accent would be by no means similar. However, the dissimilarity in the realities of said accents only served to dissociate the audience so an observer would be forced to actually think about what he or she was seeing rather than be swayed by any emotion.

There was little change in the set design during the performance. The audience was separated from the cast by a curtain, which opened and closed only twice—at the beginning and end of each of the two Acts. The only moving set piece was the wagon itself, while the background remained constant. In fact, setting changes were accomplished through the role of the narrator, not a change in set design. This choice again alienated the audience and reminded them they are watching a performance on a confined stage.

At certain points throughout the play, the characters would burst into song, or a character would play an instrument such as a guitar or even a trombone. It was the epitome of epic theatre. These scenarios were not at all believable as real-world situations, especially in the context of war. Moreover, when the characters left the staging area and entered the audience as the cast of Mother Courage, surrounding the audience and bursting into song, the audience was confronted with the “shap[ing]” of Brecht’s “hammer.”

Part IV: The Result

RC Theatre Department was challenged by Brecht’s style, trying to deliver a play that described the ironic harshness of war, both for its benefits from a capitalist perspective and its costs: in the case of Mother Courage, the cost would be the lives of her three children. It could not have been an easy style to deliver: the dialogue, nevertheless, was superb.

Mother Courage (Lucy Kindstrand ‘17)
mourns the death of her son Swiss Cheese, for whose life she bartered too long.

An audience member was likely disinclined—and even discouraged—to be emotionally moved by the play, but that was the point. The action seemed so rehearsed and at points, so ridiculous or melodramatic, that what we saw had to be what they wanted us to see—the play as a construct for commentary. I left the theatre with one singular thought: I did not know what to make of this production. I believe Brecht, and on a more local scale, RC Theatre Department, intended it this way on a confined stage.

At certain points throughout the play, the characters would burst into song, or a character would play an instrument such as a guitar or even a trombone. It was the epitome of epic theatre. These scenarios were not at all believable as real-world situations, especially in the context of war. Moreover, when the characters left the staging area and entered the audience as the cast of Mother Courage, surrounding the audience and bursting into song, the audience was confronted with the “shap[ing]” of Brecht’s “hammer.”

Part IV: The Result

RC Theatre Department was challenged by Brecht’s style, trying to deliver a play that described the ironic harshness of war, both for its benefits from a capitalist perspective and its costs: in the case of Mother Courage, the cost would be the lives of her three children. It could not have been an easy style to deliver: the dialogue, nevertheless, was superb.

An audience member was likely disinclined—and even discouraged—to be emotionally moved by the play, but that was the point. The action seemed so rehearsed and at points, so ridiculous or melodramatic, that what we saw had to be what they wanted us to see—the play as a construct for commentary. I left the theatre with one singular thought: I did not know what to make of this production. I believe Brecht, and on a more local scale, RC Theatre Department, intended it this way.