Alternative Theatre/ Political Theatre

1992 ◽  
pp. 18-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clive Barker
Keyword(s):  
Political Theatre ◽  
Alternative Theatre

Reviews were often either antagonistic to this new form of theatre or baffled by it. In both cases it frequently resulted in dismissive reviews and a rejection of the playwright. Gradually, however, the tide of anti-Brecht feeling was beginning to turn and it was given a following wind when the Berliner Ensemble made their second visit to London in 1965. Ideas in the British theatre were on the move; the arts in general in the 1960s were in a time of change and expansion. Then the ‘politicisation’ of theatre in the post-1968 period, which led to the development of the ‘fringe’ theatre scene, provided a perfect context for the rehabilitation of Brecht. His plays – including their politics this time – were ideal material for that rather un-British event, the construction of an ‘alternative’ theatre discourse. As with so much that starts artistic life as ‘alternative’, Brecht’s plays were soon absorbed into the mainstream of British theatre, and less than a decade later his work featured in the programmes of even the most conservative of repertory theatres and was hailed as ‘classic’ by the British national companies. Brecht had been appropriated. But the problem with appro-priation, of course, is that its very purpose is to pull sharp teeth and nullify political bite. And Brecht’s political message would be sanitised for a British establishment’s flirtation with socialism. As British political theatre was itself eroded by the Thatcherite 1980s, Brecht’s status within British culture – never completely convincing – became unsure. In the 1990s, Britain blinks, uncertainly and with nostalgia, in a post-cold war, post-industrial and postmodern light. Not only are the political enemies no longer identifiable, authors, too, have gone largely the way of cultural relativism. Whether there will be a meaningful place and function again for Brecht in British theatre remains to be seen. The first chapter of this book considers the context and development of Brecht’s ideas and theories on theatre performance, focusing in particular on the differences and similarities between Brecht and the ‘naturalistic’ actor/director Constantin Stanislavski – ‘measuring the distance’ between them. It then considers Brecht’s choice of actors and his methods of working with them, and how these illuminate his theoretical ideas on performance. Material is drawn from published interviews with and performance reviews of key performers such as Helene Weigel, Ekkehard Schall, Angelika Hurwicz and Charles Laughton. In Chapter 2, the subject is the penetration of British theatre by Brecht material in the 1950s. The chapter explains how both early British productions of Brecht and new playwrights in Britain were influenced by the work of the Berliner Ensemble. Two tendencies are high-lighted: that of some practitioners to imitate the outward appearances of Berliner produc-tions, thus placing the emphasis on theatrical ‘style’ rather than process, and that of others to attempt to follow Brecht’s precepts for the rehearsal process in a context ill-suited to them.

2002 ◽  
pp. 15-15
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Relativism ◽  
Political Theatre ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Performance Reviews ◽  
The Arts ◽  
Alternative Theatre ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
And Function ◽  
Post Industrial

Gay Sweatshop, Alternative Theatre, and Strategies for New Writing

2014 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 136-153
Author(s):  
Sara Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Late Phase ◽  
Puget Sound ◽  
Assistant Professor ◽  
Political Theatre ◽  
Theatre Arts ◽  
Institutional Stability ◽  
Timberlake Wertenbaker ◽  
Theatre Company ◽  
Alternative Theatre ◽  
The Moment

Gay Sweatshop spent twenty-two years producing plays as Britain's first openly gay professional theatre company. Their alternative and political work primarily took the form of author-driven new writing, though experiments with performer-driven work intrigued the company from its earliest cabarets to its late phase of queer solo work under Lois Weaver. In this article, Sara Freeman pinpoints Sweatshop's tenth anniversary new play festival in 1985 as the moment when the company committed to new writing as a strategy for gaining greater legitimacy as a theatre group and as a central mode to encourage gay and lesbian voices and representation. She argues that while this had been the default mode of much 1970s political theatre including Sweatshop's, as it played out in the 1980s, a new writing strategy represented a move toward institutional stability as the locus of theatrical radicalism shifted aesthetics. In this analysis, the celebration of company anniversaries and the creation of festival events provided occasions for the company to experience the success or failure of its policies. Freeman is Assistant Professor of Theatre Arts at the University of Puget Sound. She is the co-editor of Public Theatres and Theatre Publics (2012) and International Dramaturgy: Translation and Transformations in the Theatre of Timberlake Wertenbaker (2008). Her recent publications appear in Modern British Playwriting: the 1980s. Readings in Performance and Ecology, and the forthcoming volume The British Theatre Company from Fringe to Mainstream: Volume II 1980–1994.

Choric Theatre

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erika Fischer-Lichte
Keyword(s):  
Participatory Democracy ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
Political Theatre ◽  
New Form ◽  
Important Form

The ninth chapter, ‘Choric Theatre. Between Tragic Experience and Participatory Democracy’, discusses a new form of theatre that grew out of Greek tragedy’s chorus. While Einar Schleef used the chorus in The Mothers (1986) in order to create a new tragic theatre, in the 1990s—that is, after the protest choruses of the Monday demonstrations in the GDR had led to the fall of the Berlin Wall—choric theatre became an important form of political theatre. Mostly, these choruses were composed of local citizens, as in Volker Lösch’s Oresteia in Dresden (2003) or in theatercombinat’s The Persians (2006–8), and often even of members of a minority, as in all of Volker Lösch’s later productions. Here choric theatre gave a voice to those who had been silenced and even anticipated a utopia of a truly participatory democracy.

Performing Protest and Protesting Performance: The International Circuits of Touring Political Theatre

2021 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-69
Author(s):  
ELLIOT LEFFLER
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Cape Town ◽  
Archival Research ◽  
Political Theatre ◽  
Waiting For Godot

From 1980 to 1981, the Baxter Theatre of Cape Town, South Africa, produced a multi-racial Waiting for Godot that garnered vastly different reactions in the various cities to which it toured. With a cast led by John Kani and Winston Ntshona, icons of anti-apartheid theatre, it was sometimes hailed as a scathing anti-apartheid polemic, sometimes admired for its ‘universality’, and in one case denounced and shut down by anti-apartheid activists as a piece of pro-apartheid propaganda. Based on both archival research and interviews, this essay investigates the artists’ intentions and the public's reception in order to illuminate how the international theatrical circuits dovetailed with international activist circuits, sometimes supporting one another, and occasionally tripping each other up.

‘Plays with Subjects that Matter’: Political Theatre and the Amateur Movement in the 1930s

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 42-55
Author(s):  
Don Watson
Keyword(s):  
Media Culture ◽  
Political Theatre ◽  
North East ◽  
British Drama ◽  
Amateur Theatre ◽  
Labour History

Thousands of amateur theatre groups performed regularly in Britain during the 1930s but their activities have generally been overlooked by historians. Important features of the amateur world were the regional and national festivals organized by the British Drama League and the Scottish Community Drama Association. In this article Don Watson examines how the festivals could provide opportunities for progressive drama by groups outside the organized Left, and considers the League in relation to the Left theatre movement of the time. It broadens our understanding of where politically engaged theatre took place in the 1930s and thus the appreciation of British amateur theatre as a whole. Don Watson is an independent historian and holds a PhD from Hull University. His theatre research has been published in Labour History Review, Media, Culture and Society, and North East Labour History.

Writing for a Political Theatre

2016 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-52
Author(s):  
Eric Bentley
Keyword(s):  
Political Theatre
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