Books about postdramatic theatre

The review considers three books on post-dramatic theatre (in various studies it is also called anti-mimetic, radical, post-modern theatre, metatheatre, etc.). Different concepts of post-dramatic theatre are brought together by what may be considered as experiments per se, overcoming or problematizing genre and media boundaries, neutralizing binary oppositions, such as subject – object, playwright – director, platform – hall, actor – character, etc. I analyze the concept of H.-T. Lehmann (“Postdramatic theatre: 1999), who argues concerning the main feature of the “radical theatre” in weakening the connection with the text of the play, “re-theatricalization”, and rejection of the mimesis. For E. Fischer-Lichte (“Ästhetik des Performativen”, 2004 / “The Transformative Power of Performance: A New Aesthetics”, 2008), the main feature of the newest theatre is “performativity” – the production of aesthetic meaning within the event of a performance, and not in the perception of an artifact by an observing subject. The criteria for the so called “performative turn” in drama and theatre, which, according to Fischer-Lichte, are self-reference, materiality, bodily contact, the liminality of aesthetic experience, and the transformation of the spectator. The neoconservative point of view of G. Stadelmaier (“Director’s Theatre. On the Scenes of the Spirit of the Times”, 2016), which expresses nostalgia for the tradition, is considered as polemic in respect to the innovations of the post-drama

Gone With the Plague

This article suggests that two historical performances by the Danish subcultural theatre group Buddha og Bagbordsindianerne should be understood not simply as underground, amateur cabarets, but rather that they should be theorized as creating a critical temporality, as theorized by David Román. As such, they function to complicate the past and the present in rejecting a discourse of decency and embracing a queerer, more radical sense of citizenship. In other words, conceptualizing these performances as critical temporalities allows us not only to understand two particular theatrical performances of gay male identity and AIDS in Copenhagen in the late 1980s, but also to theorize more deeply embedded tensions between queer identities, temporality, and citizenship. Furthermore, by reading these performances and other performances like them as critical temporalities we reject the willful blindness of traditional theatre histories and make a more radical theatre history possible.

From filmed pleasure to Fun Palace

The Fun Palace, a collaborative enterprise initiated by the radical theatre producer Joan Littlewood and architect Cedric Price in early 1960s London articulated a response to the ‘increased leisure’ available to postwar British society. A critical model for cultural production in which civics met pleasure, the Fun Palace project aimed to construct situations for playful exchange conducted through self-directed actions as a way to activate audiences. Pleasure for all – a ‘breakthrough to total enjoyment’, in opposition to what was seen as existing commodified leisure practices – became understood as a critical agenda pitched against the elitist and interventionist Labour government's 1965 White Paper, A Policy for the Arts: The First Steps. Enforcing class-based distinctions between the high arts and popular entertainment, state arts policy failed to address the key role played by the media in the rise of the leisure society. In analysing British communications in the 1960s, the cultural critic Raymond Williams argued that, rather than opposing fine art with popular entertainment, social growth could only be achieved through the circulation of public and independent media, opportunities for which were at the time limited within the corporate structure of British broadcasting and press.

“This Is Father Berrigan Speaking from the Underground”: Daniel Berrigan SJ and the Conception of a Radical Theatre

The letter “Father Berrigan Speaks to the Actors from Underground” suggests the conception of a radical theatre, intended as a contribution to a cultural front against the US government as it escalated the war in Vietnam. Berrigan’s dramatization of the trial in which he and fellow antiwar activists were arraigned for publicly burning draft cards in 1968, The Trial of the Catonsville Nine, coincided with Berrigan’s efforts to continue his ministry while a fugitive.

Politics of Staging Capitalist Society in Transcultural Adaptations of Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera by Ajoka Theatre in Pakistan

Brecht’s canonical literary work’s indigenization in Pakistan can offer a valuable transcultural adaptation study because it was performed through a radical theatre with a distinct dramaturgy and political philosophy in two different cultural contexts and historical frame of references. As the foremost representative of Brecht’s radical dramaturgy, philosophy and literary works in Pakistan since 1983, Ajoka theatre utilized these adaptations as a platform for airing a critique on capitalism in Pakistan. Prior researches focused on the formal criticism: visual and aural elements. No contextual reading is conducted to explore its political and cultural dimensions of these transcultural adaptations in providing descriptive critique on capitalist society of Pakistan. Realizing the paucity of indigenous academic work in this area this article takes this initiative and addresses this ‘research gap’ by first conducting a new historicist study of Brecht selected work and its transcultural adaptations in Pakistan. This article also investigates the theatrical and cultural factors which contributed to the enormous success of these transcultural adaptations of Brecht’s selected work in Pakistan in light of Hutcheon’s theory of adaptation.

Literary Representations of Capitalist Dictatorship in Transcultural Adaptations of Brecht’s The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui by Ajoka Theatre in Pakistan

Brecht’s ‘canonical’ literary work’s indigenization in Pakistan can offer a valuable transcultural adaptation study because it was performed through a radical theatre with a distinct dramaturgy and political philosophy in two different cultural contexts and historical frame of references. As the foremost representative of Brecht’s radical dramaturgy, philosophy and literary works in Pakistan since 1983, Ajoka theatre utilized these adaptations as socio-political spaces to challenge dominant discourses on the rise of dictatorship and capitalism in Pakistan. Prior studies explored the formal elements of these adaptations of The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui(1942) : visual and aural and the intellectual content i.e. political dimension of this ‘social action theatre’ is still unexamined. This contextual reading attempts to fulfill this ‘gap’ by conducting a seminal contextual criticism on ‘literary representations’ of Pakistani pro-capitalist dictators in selected transcultural adaptations of Brecht’s work in light of new historicism and Hutcheon’s Theory of Adaptation. The article also explores how in the second phase Brecht’s social and political philosophy is reflected in Ajoka’s signature plays, Bala King (1997) and The Third Knock (1970).

Radical Theatre Mobility: Unity Theatre, UK, and the New Theatre, Australia

For two radical theatres formed in the 1930s, taking performances to their audiences was an important dimension of commitment to working-class politics and civic engagement. Separated by distance but joined ideologically, the New Theatre in Australia and Unity Theatre in the United Kingdom engaged in what they described as ‘mobile work’, as well as being ‘stage curtain’ companies. Based on archival research and drawing on mobility literature, Cathy Brigden and Lisa Milner examine in this article the rationale for mobile work, the range of spaces that were used both indoor (workplaces, halls, private homes) and outdoor (parks, street corners beaches), and its decline. Emerging from this analysis are parallels between the two theatres’ motivation for mobile work, their practice in these diverse performance spaces, and the factors leading to the decline. Cathy Brigden is an associate professor in the School of Management and Deputy Director, Centre for Sustainable Organizations and Work at RMIT University, Australia. Her current research interests include the historical experiences of women in trade unions, gender in performing arts industries, and union strategies and regulation. Lisa Milner is a lecturer in the School of Arts and Social Sciences at Southern Cross University, Coffs Harbour, Australia. Current research interests include a comparative study of workers’ theatre, representations of workers and trade unions on screen, and labour biography.