Downfall of the Egotist Johann Fatzer
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Bertolt Brecht's unfinished play begun in 1926, Der Untergang des Egoisten Johnann Fatzer, or Downfall of the Egotist Johann Fatzer is often called the Fatzer Fragments, or simply Fatzer.[1]
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[edit] EARLY WORK ON DOWNFALL OF THE EGOTIST JOHANN FATZER
Brecht wrote Fatzer over a period of years, 1926-30, basing the original idea on a newspaper report about four soldiers who had deserted from the Western Front of World War One, and were eventually discovered and killed by the German police.
The idea for the play clearly intrigued Brecht, for he kept returning to it over a period of years, working on it simultaneously with numerous other works (as was often his creative style), including the often produced anti-war play, Man Equals Man (Mann ist Mann), which was completed in 1926. According to Judith Wilke, in The Drama Review:
- As early as 1926 Brecht outlines his idea of the document as an artifact or even a fake that would become "authentic" only by provoking conflicting commentaries. In the context of Fatzer the document is reflected as a theatrical potential, vacillating between true or false, real or fictitious. Its meaning depends on the audience, which is obliged to enact and discuss it.
- Thus, Brecht favors the idea of a theatre where the spectators would be able to take part in the making of documents, embodying thereby a revolution of the theatrical process itself. Fatzer is a fragment in progress. Brecht worked on it from 1926 to 1930, covering over 500 pages with numerous drafts of the story, dramatic scenes, chorus parts, theoretical notes and bits of sentences barely decipherable.[2]
Fatzer remained unfinished and unproduced during Brecht's lifetime. However, several modern productions have been staged. Among various translations are: The Demise of the Egotist, Johann Fatzer, by Stefan Brün; and Downfall of the Egotist Johann Fatzer, by W. Stuart McDowell. Also important is the Fatzer Material by Marc von Henning.[3]
The first German production of the Fatzer Fragments, called Der Untergang des Egoisten Johnann Fatzer was premiered at the Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer in (then) West Berlin, directed by Frank Patrick Steckel, with sets by Karl-Ernst Herrmann, costumes by Joachim Herzogthat, on November 3, 1976.[4]
The first professional English-language production premiered in New York, Off Broadway, November 9, 1978 (right). This production was inspired by the first German production of two years before, but in no way attempted to copy that production, but rather endeavored to develop a produciton style more appropriate to Brecht's theatre work of the 1920's.
[edit] The American Premiere of Downfall of the Egotist Johann Fatzer
The American premiere of Downfall of the Egotist Johann Fatzer took place November 9, 1978, Off Broadway at the Shelter West Theatre Company, directed by W. Stuart McDowell, then Artistic Director of the Riverside Shakespeare Company of New York, where McDowell subsequently staged the New York premiere of another of Brecht's early plays, Edward II.
Permission for the English translation and subsequent production was granted by Brecht's agent Bertha Case on behalf of the Brecht estate
[edit] Use of Music
The New York production of Fatzer featured a cabaret-style score composed by Tony Award-winning arranger and composer, Bruce Coughlin, played by a small jazz ensemble, and sung by leading chanteuse from Ireland and interpreter of Brecht's works, Agnes Bernelle (photo, right). Agnes Bernelle, who had performed in several productions of Brecht's work in Ireland and England. Miss Bernelle had also recorded the popular record Bernelle on Brecht and..., produced by Philip Chevron of The Radiators and released in limited numbers by The Midnite Music Company in 1977.
The production also made extensive use of ballad-like songs woven into the production, as was common in many if not most of the productions of Brecht's plays, in particular Die Dreigroschenoper (The Threepenny Opera) which Brecht wrote with Kurt Weill during the period of the writing of Fatzer. The songs in Fatzer made comment upon the action that had transpired, or was to come, as a means of both entertaining the audience and drawing a deeper lesson out of the story.
[edit] The Staging
The production at the Shelter West Theatre Company incorporated several production techniques pioneered by Brecht as director, beginning with his signature "half-act curtain" (see photo, above). This curtain was used in the production both as a projection surface, to receive titles of scenes and songs, as well as photographic images taken from historic sources from Germany of the time.
At times, while songs were being sung by Agnes Bernelle, the curtain was an opaque surface, like a white chalk board, and at other times, the curtain became transparent, revealing a scene from the play behind (see photos, right). The curtain was suspended on a simple set of wires, and parted in the middle to reveal each scene.[5]
Featured in the cast were Trude Mathis, Jim Maxson, William Mesnik, Kaeren Peregrin, Peter Siiteri, and members of the Shelter West company.
[edit] References
- ^ For the most recent German compilation of Brecht's works on this, see Der Untergang des Egoisten Johann Fatzer, Bühnenfassung von Heiner Müller. Frankfurt Suhrkamp 1996; ISBN/EAN: 3518133322.
- ^ Judith Wilke, "The Making of a Document: An Approach to Brecht's Fatzer Fragment," The Drama Review, 43.4 (1999) 122-128.
- ^ The University of Wisconsin Digital collection, reference at http://digicoll.library.wisc.edu/BrechtGuide/
- ^ See the website for the Schaubühne, at the new website for this theatre: http://www.schaubuehne.de/haus/chronik.php?id_language=2
- ^ The Village Voice, November 14, 1978.
