How to put on Brecht

BERTOLT BRECHT’S

THE RESISTIBLE RISE OF ARTURO UI

Instructions for Performance

In order that the events may retain the significance unhappily due them, the play must be performed in the grand style, and preferably with obvious harkbacks to the Elizabethan theatre, i.e., with curtains of whitewashed sacking spattered the colour of ox blood. At some points panorama-like backdrops could be used, and organ, trumpet, and drum effects are likewise permissible. Use should be made of the masks, vocal characteristics, and gestures of the originals; pure parody however must be avoided, and the comic element must not preclude horror. What is needed is a three-dimensional presentation which goes at top speed and is composed of clearly defined groupings like those favoured by historical tableaux at fairs. Bertolt Brecht ‘Hinweis für die Aufführung,’ from GW Stücke