Director's Notes
It was Bertold Brecht's secretary who first read John Gray's "A beggar's opera" and translated it for him. Brecht was delighted by the story about gangsters, beggars and whores and set about adapting the play. He soon asked Kurt Weill, with whom he had already worked, to write some incidental music to accompany the text. Such gems as 'Mack the knife' and 'Pirate Jenny' were a result of this contribution, but it was not until they sent the play to Ernst-Josef Aufricht, a young actor who had decided to become a producer, that they found someone ready to take a gamble on their story which was a patchwork of styles. One week before the play opened no one believed in its success. There were constant cast changes; Rosetta Valletti, who played Mrs Peachum was so confident that the play would fold in a matter of days that she signed a contract with another production, and Aufricht was desperately looking around for a play that he could put on instead of "The Threepenny Opera".
On the evening of the premiere in August, 1928 the play opened to a skeptical audience. Lotte Lenya, Kurt Weill's wife, described the atmosphere as cold and apathetic, but by the end of Act 1 the audience was on its feet, cheering and applauding. From that day on, Berlin was swept by a "Threepenny Opera" fever. Cafés opened playing no other music, other writers and musicians rushed to write plays in the same style. Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill had found the pulse of their time and using the epic form of theatre they managed to dramatically change the German theatre of the 20th century.
Brecht once said that, 'our future lies in our contradictions'. Nearly eighty years on "the Threepenny Opera" still speaks to us. Its story may be set in a depraved London but its theme of survival, manipulation, disillusionment and amorality is just as true today as it was then. Maybe Brecht should have said: 'The future, like the present, will be made of our contradictions.'
Charlie Lucarotti
Die English Theatre Group of Zug hat in den vergangenen Jahren schon die bekanntesten "all-american" Musicals mit viel Erfolg auf die Bühne gebracht - mit der "Dreigroschenoper" (die keine Oper sein will - oder wie der Name schon sagt: höchstens eine für "drei Groschen") erweitern wir unser Programm um ein sehr europäisches Stück!
Der Autor Bertold Brecht, geboren 1898 in Augsburg, ist einer der wichtigsten Dramatiker des 20. Jh. und hat mit seinen Werken das moderne Theater wesentlich mitgeprägt.
Die am 31. August 1928 im Berliner Theater am Schiffbauerdamm uraufgeführte "Dreigroschenoper" war sein internationaler Durchbruch und das Theatererlebnis der 20-er Jahre, frisch und frech, aber inhaltlich weit genug weg für eine kritische Reflexion der sozialen Missstände, die sie beschreibt. Die Zusammenarbeit mit dem Komponisten Kurt Weill stellte sich als Glücksfall heraus: seine Lieder "Moritat von Mackie Messer", das "Lied der Seeräuberjenny" oder die Ballade "Wovon lebt der Mensch" erfahren zur Zeit eine regelrechte Renaissance - Weills Zusammensetzung von Jazz-, Kirchenmusik- und Opernelementen in der Musik der "Dreigroschenoper" war damals wie heute modern. Mit einer Gruppe von ca. 50 Personen sind wir schon mittendrin in den Proben, in dieser Musik und dieser skurilen rührenden Geschichte von menschlichen Widersprüchen……..und Toleranz.
Dorothee Roth