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The Threepenny Opera Redux
| Article
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15382 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
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12 / 1989 |
822 Words |
| Author
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Cynthia Grenier
Cynthia Grenier is contributing editor to the Arts section of
The World & I. |
You can see it from Sting's point of view. Here you are, one of the world's top rock musicians. You've gotten some pretty good notices as an actor in a number of serious films like David Hare's Plenty, playing opposite the reigning queen of serious actresses, Meryl Streep. You care about really serious causes like Amnesty International, the Brazilian rain forests, and the mistreatment of the native Indians there.
So when an eminently serious movie producer comes along with eminently correct artistic and political credentials (Midnight Cowboy, Coming Home, The Mosquito Coast) and suggests you star in a stage production of Bertolt Brecht's best-known work, The Threepenny Opera, with music by Kurt Weill, you go for it.
As did the entire East coast press. Sting as Mack the Knife was featured on the cover of New York Magazine and the special supplement of the New York Times headlining the new fall season's most promising goodies. Sting in The Threepenny Opera certainly looked like the hottest ticket in town. Under the direction of John Dexter, fresh from the Pulitzer Prize-winning play, M. Butterfly, The Threepenny Opera opened out of town at Washington, D.C.'s National Theatre in September. The reviews of the local press were, well, less than enthusiastic.
And one can see why, even without comparing the production to any others, let alone reading Brecht's own notes on the original Die Dreigroschenoper created sixty years ago. In a worthy enough stand against the current practice of milking musical productions, Sting opted for the first week or so to sing without benefit of electronic support. The rest of the cast followed suit. The lyrics,
... (1998 of 4812 Characters)
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