Cabaret

Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht, one of the most famous political satirists and theatre theorists of the 1900s, had a major
influence on Berlin Cabaret. Brecht created the Berliner Ensemble, a post-war theatre company that
included the actress Helene Weigel and toured many successful productions internationally, including the
premier of The Threepenny Opera in 1929. His legacy includes such greats as Dario Fo, Augusto Boal,
Tony Kushner and Caryl Churchill.
Epic Theatre Basics
• Audience members are constantly aware that they are watching a production; they never lose the reality of
their role as spectators. The design of the production excludes all illusion, providing each spectator with the
ability to think for his or herself without becoming lost in a theatrical world.
• Brecht drew from the Chinese theatre for inspiration for his acting technique, Verfremdungseffekt, or the
Alienation Effect. It is essential that actors maintain some sort of disconnect from their characters in order
to allow the audience to see the character with a critical eye. This disconnect is often accomplished through
breaking of the fourth wall, and direct address of the audience out of character.
• To avoid all aspects of escapism, Epic theatre is full of public announcements, signs or captions, and
comedic techniques to distance its audience from the events of the play.
• Brecht saw little importance in pointless spectacle and biased plotlines, thus he created a theatre where the
audience can be struck with a presentation of issues as they are, broken down and simplified.
• In order to support non-realistic anti-melodramatic epic productions, Brechtian stage designs take an
abstract and unrealistic form, and are sometimes paired with more appropriate and traditional costume and
prop designs.
Gestus
Gestus is an acting technique that carries the sense of a combination of physical gesture and "gist" or
attitude. It is a means by which "an attitude or single aspect of an attitude" is revealed, insofar as it is
"expressible in words or actions.” Gestus, as the embodiment of an attitude, carries at least two distinct
meanings in Brecht's theatre: firstly, the uncovering or revealing of the motivations and transactions that
underpin a dramatic exchange between the characters; secondly, the "epic" narration of that character by the
actor (whether explicitly or implicitly).
Dramatic Theatre Epic Theatre
Plot narrative
Implicates the spectator in a stage situation turns the spectator into an observer, but
Wears down his capacity for action arouses his capacity for action
Provides him with sensations forces him to take decisions
Experience Picture of the world
The spectator is involved in something he is made to face something
Suggestion argument
Instinctive feelings are preserved brought to the point of recognition
The spectator is in the thick of it the spectator stands outside, studies
The human being is taken for granted the human being is the object of the inquiry
He is unalterable he is alterable and able to alter
Eyes on the finish eyes on the course
One scene makes another each scene for itself
Growth montage
Linear development in curves
Evolutionary determinism jumps
Man as a fixed point man as a process
Thought determines being social being determines thought
Feeling reason
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