Epic Theater and Bertolt Brecht

Epic Theater was one of the numerous theatrical movements in the early 20th century that swept through the world, totally changing the face of how theater was perceived and forever altering theater as a whole. Epic Theater was arguably one of the more influential theatrical movements of the time, bringing about changes to the world of theater that are still relevant today. It was first developed in Germany in the 1920s, in the wake of the theatrical movement known as Expressionism, by Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), a rather radical thinker who was the first to create a major alternative to the 'Stanislavski-oriented realism.' ("Brecht" 1) Epic Theater was so called because Brecht though it had much in common with epic poetry 'in which dialogue and narration alternate and in which time and place are quickly transformed.' (Brockett, 187)

Brecht was born in 1898 in Germany, and began to show potential for artistic prowess as a young boy, beginning with poetry, and had his first poetry published in 1914. Much of his work was influenced by philosopher Karl Marx and his ideals and themes about society; the notion that 'man and society could be intellectually analyzed' ("Brecht" 1) would prove to be of great importance to his later works. He enrolled as a medical student at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in 1917, but abandoned his studies completely in 1921, right around the time when his association with the Communist party began, when he joined the Independent Social Democratric party. His first play, 'BAAL', celebrating life and sexuality was first produced in 1923 and was very successful. In 1924, he was named a consultant to Max Reinhardt, where he found further success with Trommeln In Der Nacht in 1922, and Die Dreigroschenoper, (The Three Penny Opera) both of which made fun of the bourgeois. In particular, The Three Penny Opera is still widely performed and considered to be some of his most well-known work. Although he had been associated with Communism for several years, he did not officially join the part until 1929, after studying Karl Marx's Das Kapital. In the early 1930s, Brecht's books and plays were banned in Germany, and he fled into exile, going from place to place until arriving in the United States in the early 1940s. He attempted to make a living in Hollywood, but found that '"The intellectual isolation here is enormous . . . Compared to Hollywood, Svenborg was a world center.'" ("Brecht 1898-1956") He finally returned to Germany in 1948, where he founded his own Marxist theater, Berliner Ensemble. In the years that followed, Brecht enjoyed continual support from audiences all around Germany, receiving the Stalin Peace Prize in 1955, before dying of a coronary thrombosis on August 14th, 1956 in East Berlin.

Without question, one of Brecht's most profound and influential contributions to modern theater was his notion of Epic Theater. When he first visualized his concept of Epic Theater, he did not want the theater to be a place of illusion, as it had been for so long previously, where the performance as considered a mere illusion, but something that would make the audience think, to see the characters as a small part of a larger problem. He had gotten the idea largely from studying the works of Marx, where he inherited the notion that many of the world's problems were a direct result of capitalism, and could easily be fixed by taking in the virtues of communism or socialism. In all his work he then 'sought to make audiences evaluate the socioeconomic implications of what they saw in theater' (Brockett, 186) He called this process, which applied to audiences as well as to performers, to varying degrees, the Verfremdungseffekt, or the process of alienation.

In order to achieve this process, he needed to distance the audience from the events onstage so that the events can be viewed without bias. Brecht utilized many different stage, lighting and scenery techniques to this end, to help the audience along into becoming sufficiently alienated enough so that they could view the play as Brecht meant it to be viewed. First, he did not bother to hide the fact that the audience was in fact, sitting in a theater watching a play unfold; where his predecessors in theater wanted the audience to become so engrossed in the play they felt like it was actually a real event unfurling for the first time before their eyes. To achieve this, he made sure that lighting equipment was in plain sight and that any scenery was fractional, its only purpose to establish a place. In addition, one of the key elements of much of Brecht's work was that of distancing the story through time and place; a trait much used by the various other forms of theater movement at the time. Furthermore, Brecht also thought that an effective theatrical production did not combine all forms of art, as did Wagner and other lead directors of Brecht's time, but rather that each individual element of art making up the production should make its own commentary about the situation. He often used songs to reinforce his central idea of alienation even more so to emphasize breaks in the action of the story and also to help get the point across. However, despite his numerous attempts in a single show to get the audience to think about the social ramifications of what was happening on stage, many theatergoers remained oblivious to what he was attempting, and simply instead enjoyed his shows on a level of pure entertainment.

The actors in particular further helped in this process of distancing the audience from events; they often spoke or sang directly to the audience, thereby breaking the fourth wall that had been so crucial in previous theatrical performances, and demonstrated feelings, emotion and character rather than merely copying from tired stereotypes, as had been so often done in the past. This process of detachment or distancing also happened to the actor, long before the show opened. In rehearsal the actors would always address their characters in the third person and using past tense, and to actually say stage directions aloud. Brecht urged his actors to present their characters to the audience; totally going against all of Stanislavsky's teachings on how important it was to actually become the character.

In the end, Brecht's incalculable influence on theater is still being felt. In various types of musical comedies and plays, most notably those partaking in theater in the round, the actors occasionally interact directly with audience members, just as Brecht had his own actors do in an attempt to break down the fourth wall. Of all the various different theatrical movements in the early part of the twentieth century, Brecht's is arguably one of the more important ones, especially when the actual impact on theater in the present is measured. His process of wanting the audience to subjectively view the on-stage action and apply it to their own life is echoed in many modern shows, including Waiting for Godot, Never the Sinner, The Glass Menagerie, and many others. Perhaps his greatest contribution to the world of theater is his attempts at getting audiences to see deep meaning in theater and how theater often times serves as prime examples of many of the trials and tribulations that life has to offer.

Works Cited

Brockett, G. Oscar, and Ball, J. Robert. 'The Essential Theater 8th ed'. Belmont, CA: Thomson Wadsworth, 2004

Goosens, Shay. 'Bertolt Brecht: A Theatrical Genius'. 1997. 19 Apr. 2004 http://www.geocities.com/Broadway/Stage/1052/brecht5.htm

Bertolt Brecht. 1998. 19 Apr. 2004 www.geocities.com/percymonkey/indevbrecht.html

Liukkonen, Petri. 'Bertolt Brecht' (1898-1956) 2002. 19 Apr. 2004 www.kirjasto.sci.fi/brecht.htm

Hill, Claude. 'Bertolt Brecht' Indiana: Twayne Publishers, 1975