State Theatre Research Articles

Big band jazz in black West Virginia, 1930-1942

Big Band Jazz in Black West Virginia, 1930-1942. By Christopher Wilkinson. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2012. 197pp (hardcover). Illustrations. ISBN 978-1-61703-168-7. $55 In 1934, Irving Mills blackballed Jimmie Lunceford from the major New York theatres, radio audiences, and hotel ballrooms that his orchestra had consistently played over the years. Lunceford left after becoming fed up with Mills' exploitation, but the timing, deep in the throes of the Great Depression, was far from perfect. He knew that he had to find the steadiest work possible for his band, and fast, so he hit the road, like so many other jazz musicians did in the 1930s, towards ... the coal camps of West Virginia. Christopher Wilkinson's wonderfully researched Big Band Jazz in Black West Virginia, 1930-1942 yields a number of such revelatory anecdotes as he presents for us the vibrant dance culture of West Virginia during the long 1930s. African-American miners indeed created a remarkable and unique space in the hills of West Virginia, unlike anything witnessed during that time in the Jim Crow South, from where most of them had arrived. Railroad construction and the operation of high-quality bituminous coal mines in West Virginia required highly concentrated labor. African-American sharecroppers from the South were among the first to take advantage of this opportunity, particularly as welcomed members of the United Mine Workers Association; the work was extremely dangerous, but the financial incentive was hard to ignore, particularly after the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 virtually guaranteed the union members well-paying work for the remainder of that tumultuous decade. With disposable cash in hand, they often turned to dance band music. Wilkinson in fact documents 356 public dances held for African-Americans between 1930 and 1942 in the state. African-American southerners indeed had much reason to celebrate in West Virginia: there they wielded a politically influential right to vote, they succeeded in banning racist films such as Birth of a Nation from the state's theaters, secured an anti-lynching law, and, as Wilkinson demonstrates through the vivid remembrance of Lionel Hampton's trumpeter, Joe Wilder, enjoyed the dignify of integrated seating in train cars. One of Wilkinson's contributions lies in his ability to use a musical micro-history of West Virginia's coal camps in order to further disrupt the dichotomies that originally defined the work of many music scholars: those of rural versus urban entertainments, of hot versus sweet jazz adherents, and of the musical preferences of whites versus blacks and middle class versus working class audiences. From the days of medicine shows, West Virginians had become well versed in the cosmopolitan, commercial musics that emanated from New York and Chicago. Enhanced through the distribution of phonographs and the reach of radio deep into the hollers of the mountains, indeed the most well-known orchestras arrived behind a long line of local and territory, or regional, jazz and dance bands that had long played their hit parade renditions both to white and black audiences. Despite the equity gained by African-Americans in some of West Virginia's social and political arenas, their dances remained segregated. Wilkinson demonstrates through his examination of local newspapers how African-American jazz and dance orchestras began to create interesting fissures in the divide: when Don Redman performed at the Fairmont armory in 1934, the West Virginian reported that in addition to the biggest crowd of colored terpsichorean experts ever assembled at one time on the local floor . …

Chris R. Kyle. Theater of State: Parliament and Political Culture in Early Stuart England. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012. xi + 276 pp. $60. ISBN: 978–0–8047–5288–6.

Chris R. Kyle. Theater of State: Parliament and Political Culture in Early Stuart England. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012. xi + 276 pp. $60. ISBN: 978–0–8047–5288–6.

Royal Loges and Reserved Seats: From the History of State Theaters in 1917

Февральская революция внесла значительные изменения в деятельность бывших императорских театров, ставших теперь государственными. Одним из них стала борьба за бывшие «царские» ложи, владельцы которых (члены императорской фамилии) уже не могли ими пользоваться. Наряду с этим, дебатировался вопрос о том, кто при новом режиме имеет право на получение бесплатного места в зрительном зале. Некоторые радикально настроенные артисты и театральные критики предлагали отменить любые привилегии при посещении театров. Но представители правительства (комиссар Временного Правительства над бывшим Министерством императорского двора Ф.А. Головин и главноуполномоченный по государственным театрам Ф.Д. Батюшков) выработали новые правила, согласно которым многие привилегии были сохранены. Большинство «царских» лож было передано в пользование членам Временного Правительства, что вызвало разочарование у ряда театральных деятелей. Анализ борьбы за «царские ложи» и бесплатные места показывает, что преобразования, осуществленные Временным Правительством в государственных театрах, были далеко не такими глубокими, как ожидали многие артисты и работники сцены сразу после Февраля.

Analyse und Evaluation von akuten Verletzungen bei Musicaldarsteller/Innen

Specific requirements in the Musical field such as the versatility of abilities in dancing, singing and acting, the aspiration for perfection as well as the high number of performances, lead to a high amount of occupational accidents not yet evaluated. Aim of this study is, therefore, to analyze and evaluate occupational accidents in Musical performers and to suggest preventive concepts. The data of this evaluation comprise occupational accident reports of consultants, accident reports of various Berlin theatres as well as case records of all Berlin State Theatres (n=89, m: 58, f: 31) of the Berlin State Accident Insurance covering a period 12-year period. A total of 60.3% of the accidents happen during performances, 24.4% during rehearsals, and 6.7% during the training. Lower extremity injuries (m: 61.1%, f: 58.2%) are the most common for performers. The majority of injuries (m: 46.3%, f: 50.0%) happens during ordinary dance movements. Altogether 66.7% of the injuries have a uniquely defined exogenous cause. The dance partner is with 17.9% the most common exogenous cause, followed by props (15.4%) and dance floor (11.6%). 66.3% of all accidents happen in the first three hours after starting work with an incidence in the evenings. There are gender specific differences. Parallels can be drawn (e.g. injured structures, type of injuries) to the professional dance and the dance theatre, however, there are also differences (e.g. age, injury location) Due to the results and the work specific requirements the Musical is to be considered as an autonomous field among the performing arts. Above all, the majority of injuries are - compared to other dance styles - caused by exogenous factors. Modifications may here reduce the incidence. At that, an early interaction in the planning progress of a production, an optimal selection of physical and psychic qualified performers as well as an improvement of training conditions are primary steps towards an injury prevention.

THE AUDACITY OF TRUTH: THE ANTIGONE OF ARIS ALEXANDROU, A PLAY OF ISLAND DETENTION FROM THE GREEK CIVIL WAR

Abstract This article offers a thematic reading of the Antigone play that the Greek poet Aris Alexandrou finished writing in 1951, while pushed into isolation on the prison islands for leftist detainees of the Greek Civil War. It also discusses the 2003 stage production of the play by director Victor Arditti and the State Theatre of Northern Greece. Alexandrou's free adaptation of Sophocles' Antigone delivers the complex other side of the radical resistance that inspired postwar Greek politics and culture. The playwright's political views made him suffer exile within the ‘internal exile’ of his detainment on the prison islands, and the same holds true for his young and idealist protagonist Antigone. Thus the play becomes an essential piece of the less well documented debate between the Greek Left and those pushed out from within. Therefore, too, it has been particularly vulnerable to criticism – or to a fate worse than criticism: oblivion.

Analyse und Evaluation von Arbeitsunfällen im professionellen Sport am Beispiel des Tanztheaters

The dance theatre is an autonomous form of presentation within the performing arts. It is a combination of dance, drama, singing and speaking. As the actors are usually professional dancers the dance theatre is associated with the professional dance. Compared with other dance styles there is an enhanced usage of props, costumes or décor to intensify the production and the expressiveness. In contrast to the defined professional dance technique the range of movements is unlimited. There has not yet been done any research on the influence of props as well as décor in terms of exogenous factors potentially favouring injuries. Aim of this study is to characterize specific injury patterns, as well as their causes and to suggest basic approaches to prevent injuries in the dance theatre. The data of this evaluation comprise occupational accident reports, accident reports of various Berlin theatres as well as case records of all Berlin State Theatres (n = 1106) of the Berlin State Accident Insurance over a 9-year period. 103occupational accidents are accounted for the dance theatre. 44.6 % of the accidents happen during rehearsals, 42.4 % during performances, 76.7 % on stage and adjoining areas and 10.7 % in the ballet studio. Second most common movement resulting in an injury are jumps with 25.4 %. Altogether 69.7 % of the accidents have a uniquely defined exogenous cause with 30.5 % by props, 12.7 % by the floor and 17.2 % by the dance partner. 30.3 % of the accidents have multifactorial causes (e. g. the social situation, state of training and nutrition). 61 % of all accidents happen within three hours after starting work with an increase of occupational accidents between 11:00 - 12:00 hrs and 08:00- 09:00 hrs. The lower extremity is the most affected location (53.3 %), followed by the head/neck area (21.4 %) and the upper extremity (17.5 %). Contusions (26.2 %), distortions (17.5 %), muscular strains (19.4 %) and wounds (13.6 %) are the most frequent types of injuries. In combination with the partly undefined movement pattern the majority of the acute injuries is - compared to other dance styles - above all caused by susceptible exogenous factors. Corrections of the daily routine, the working conditions, state of training as well as of the state of nutrition of the dancers may be initial steps towards injury prevention. At that, early interactions and interventions in the planning process of a dance theatre production could help to minimize the amount of accidents caused by exogenous factors and contribute to a practicable injury prevention in the dance theatre.

Frank Castorf at the Volksbühne am Rosa Luxembourg Platz: Alienation Techniques and the Use of Mediated Material on the Live Stage

Frank Castorf at the Volksbühne am Rosa Luxembourg Platz Alienation Techniques and the Use of Mediated Material on the Live Stage Steve Earnest Throughout the latter years of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first century, the use of film, video, and mediated settings became an increasingly important aspect of scenography at Germany’s largest state theatres. Key developments in stage technology— such as the use of high-powered projectors, the use of glass slides instead of those made of plastic or acetate, and the increasing use of digital video technologies—permitted greater experimentation with live and mediated action and comprised a permanent part of the German theatre landscape . Given the immense technical capabilities of the German state theatres in addition to their high levels of national funding, multimedia advances have been arguably more profound in Germany than in any place in the world. Perhaps no stage director was more influential in this arena than Frank Castorf, noted Intendant of Berlin’s Volksbühne am Rosa Luxembourg Platz. From the mid-1980s until the first decade of the twenty-first century Castorf integrated the arts of theatre and cinema in a manner that both heightened the art of stage direction in Germany as well as modified and advanced numerous theatrical concepts, such as the Brechtian concept of verfremdungseffekt, or alienation. Other ideas associated with Brechtian epic theatre, such as montage and the use of music, as well as more radical techniques of deconstruction and postmodern structure as advanced by Heiner Müller, were also employed by Castorf. Unique in his combination of the dual aesthetic of theatre and film, Castorf’s use of cameras on the live stage has challenged theatre aesthetics by contrasting the live stage figure with the full or partial human face in close-up, by utilizing multiple cameras on different 42 S T E v E E A R N E S T areas of the theatrical space and by incorporating the act of filming and camera work into the action of his works. Three of Castorf’s productions , Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Erniedrigte Und Beleidigte (The Insulted and the Injured), Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita, and Bertolt Brecht’s Der Jasager/Der Neinsager (He Who Says Yes/He Who Says No),1 serve to illustrate Castorf’s varied directorial approaches and his unique film/theatre aesthetic. Founded in 1914, the Volksbühne has historically been a regular site for live productions that experimented with multimedia and film. The early period of the Volksbühne included multimedia work by Erwin Piscator and the young Brecht; its middle period as a state theatre of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) featured radical experimentation involving Soviet-influenced film and video techniques under the leadership of Benno Besson. Throughout the later years of the GDR and into the post-reunification period, Castorf emerged into the Berlin scene as an enfant terrible, a radical young director who mounted numerous shockingly provocative productions that challenged GDR politics while pushing artistic mores to their breaking point and that subsequently advanced postmodern techniques such as collage structure and deconstruction. An important element of Castorf’s dramaturgy and theatre aesthetic at the Volksbühne was the commingling of live and mediated material as well as the inclusion of rock music (the Rolling Stones and other iconic rock groups have always been prevalent in his work) and numerous references to popular culture. Having served as Intendant since 1992, Castorf steadily developed a reputation as one of the most provocative, innovative , yet notorious directors on the German stage. As a student of Theaterwissenschaft (or Theatre Science) at Humbolt Universität in Berlin in the 1970s, Castorf had studied the theories of Brecht but favored the more radical structure of Müller in practice. Because the strict stance regarding socialist realism had become more relaxed in the GDR in the 1970s, Müller’s synthetic fragments and collage works (such as Hamletmaschine, published in 1971) had become extremely influential among academics. After staging a number of television projects for the East German Television system (DEFA) Castorf began to incorporate ideas of collage structure, including video and other mediated material , into his directorial vision. Alternatively praised...

Foreplay (review)

Reviewed by: Foreplay Loren Kruger Foreplay. By Mpumelelo Paul Grootboom, after Arthur Schnitzler's Der Reigen (aka La Ronde). Market Theatre, Johannesburg. 5 September 2009. More interested in contemporary society than in the anti-apartheid legacy, Paul Grootboom is very much a post-apartheid playwright. After writing for local soap opera, he achieved notoriety for the graphic sex and violence in two recent plays, Cards (2005) and Relativity (2006; co-written with Presley Chweneyagae, star of the Oscar award-winning Tsotsi). Like Cards and Relativity, Foreplay premiered at the State Theatre in the capital Pretoria/Tshwane before transferring to the Market Theatre. Roughly based on Schnitzler's century-old drama about sex and hypocrisy among characters identified only by their social roles, Foreplay continues this trend of dramas of sex and violence with a merry-go-round of encounters between unlikely partners who are consumed sometimes by guilt or resentment but always by lust. As against apartheid-era theatre that sought to challenge the state by dramatizing its agents of violent oppression, Grootboom disavows such serious intent, asking ironically in his director's note in the program: "What can be more fun than watching ten people having sex with each other, talk about crap, and give each other STDs?" Despite his disclaimer, however, the mention of sexually transmitted diseases could not but remind the local audience that, in this country with one of the highest AIDS infection rates in the world and one of the highest rates of rape, all too often sex equals death. The set and lighting (by Wilhelm Diesbergen) remained spare and dark throughout, occasionally featuring a bed or an upholstered chair, but always framed by security fencing that also could signify the perimeter of an outside shebeen (bar). Despite the absence of bourgeois accouterments, some protagonists resembled Schnitzler's figures quite closely, as in the tryst between a fat and nervous middle-aged woman (Ntshepiseng Montshiwa) and a student or "spoilt young man" (Mandla Gaduka) who interact in English. Most, however, took on a local look and sound, mixing their English with vernaculars like North Sotho, Grootboom's home language, and drawing on stories in the news as well as in high and popular culture. The sex-worker in the first scene seduced not an actual soldier, but a robber who had stolen the soldier's money and uniform. The flamboyant preacher (Sello Zikalala, also playing the fake soldier) who seduced a schoolgirl after preaching forgiveness for sexual lapses recalled not only Jimmy Swaggart, whom he quoted directly, but also a long line of hypocritical preachers on the South African stage known for their melodramatic though forceful exaggeration. The apparently naive girl persuaded to have sex in exchange for "help with school" tellingly recalled similar representations Click for larger view View full resolution Koketso Mojela (schoolgirl), Sello Zikalala (preacher, foreground), and Excellentia Mokoena (sex worker, background) in Foreplay. (Photo: Ruphin Coudyzer.) [End Page 453] of students forced to exchange sex for school fees, whether fictional, by artists like the late painter Trevor Makhoba and by soap opera, or fact, documented by news and social research. Playing this tricky role, the slight, though seasoned Koketso Mojela impressed even viewers familiar with her television roles, such as a cynical secretary in the caustic parliamentary satire 90 Plein Street, with her ability to perform naiveté and worldliness in compelling juxtaposition. Shadowed by the looming facts of widespread sexual abuse, Foreplay managed nonetheless to maintain author/director Grootboom's sense of irony. Mimicking Dr. Schnitzler's clinical portrayal of lust that levels class and age distinctions to leave individuals at the mercy of their reflexes, each scene portrayed a tryst between a lustful and an initially unwilling participant, which began with resistance, feigned or panicked, moved through a dance of thrusting and yielding, and ended in consummation signified by performers blowing and popping bubble-gum balloons. While the repetition of deliberately formulaic gesture kept the audience at a cool distance at the end of each scene, the acting style within scenes varied considerably—sometimes being merely verbose, sometimes captivating spectators despite their evident discomfort. In the first case, Grootboom allowed the playmaker as his alter ego to indulge in the...

Cleansed

September 01 2010 Cleansed Thomas Bradshaw Thomas Bradshaw Thomas Bradshaw's Mary will premiere at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago next season. His play The Bereaved, currently running at the State Theatre of Bielefeld in Germany, was named one of the Best Plays of 2009 in Time Out New York. His plays Southern Promises and Dawn were listed among the Best Performances of Stage and Screen for 2008 in The New Yorker. Bradshaw is the recipient of a 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Thomas Bradshaw Thomas Bradshaw's Mary will premiere at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago next season. His play The Bereaved, currently running at the State Theatre of Bielefeld in Germany, was named one of the Best Plays of 2009 in Time Out New York. His plays Southern Promises and Dawn were listed among the Best Performances of Stage and Screen for 2008 in The New Yorker. Bradshaw is the recipient of a 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship. Online Issn: 1537-9477 Print Issn: 1520-281X © 2010 Thomas Bradshaw2010 PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art (2010) 32 (3 (96)): 85–99. https://doi.org/10.1162/PAJJ_a_00011 Cite Icon Cite Permissions Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Search Site Citation Thomas Bradshaw; Cleansed. PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 2010; 32 (3 (96)): 85–99. doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/PAJJ_a_00011 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentAll JournalsPAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art Search Advanced Search This content is only available as a PDF. © 2010 Thomas Bradshaw2010 Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Marginalising the Mainstream: A Signed Performance of <i>The Miracle Worker</i> Places Deaf Issues Centre-Stage

William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker was staged at the Brisbane Powerhouse June 2009 by Crossbow Productions. In this adaption, people with hearing impairment were privileged through the use of shadow-signing, unscripted signing and the appropriation of signing as a theatrical language in itself. 250 people living with hearing impairment attended the production, 70 had never attended a theatrical event before. During the post-performance discussions hearing audience members expressed feelings of displacement through experiencing the culture of the deaf society and not grasping some of the ideas. This paper argues that this inversion enhanced meaning making for all and illustrates a way forward to encourage the signing of more theatrical events.

Crazy World (review)

Reviewed by: Crazy World Laurence Raw Crazy World. Adapted by Barış Erdenk from The Insane of Valencia by Lope de Vega. Van State Theatre at the Şinasi Sahnesi, Ankara, Turkey. 3 April 2009. The Insane of Valencia differs from many of Lope de Vega’s most well-known comedies that deal with the power of love (for example, The Idiot Lady). In terms of theme and structure, it is closer to The Dog in the Manger; its use of parody and burlesque satirizes a society preoccupied with hollow notions of class and behavior. The Insane of Valencia is set in a lunatic asylum, where the inmates assume and cast off various roles as they act out a series of dramatic performances for their own benefit. Using both a translation by Adalet Cimcoz and quasi-Brechtian staging techniques, director Barış Erdenk updated the play in an attempt to explain the economic crisis that dominates the headlines in contemporary Turkey, despite Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s insistence that the country has at last “turned the corner.” In Erdenk’s view, the crisis had two principal causes: mistrust of foreign investment, and corrupt politicians. The first of these was clearly apparent in a comic set piece, in which one (unnamed) cast member impersonated a Japanese entrepreneur vainly trying to communicate with prospective Turkish clients. In spite of his gestures of politeness—inclining his head, smiling, or standing to attention like a soldier—no one seemed either willing or able to engage with him. Eventually, he was bundled unceremoniously offstage by two police officers. The scene had some good-natured fun at the expense of the Japanese, who were identified in a program note as representatives of the kind of global capitalism that caused the crisis in the first place. Erdenk also indicated that while the business community had plenty of opportunity to improve the economic situation—through trade agreements, for example—its underlying suspicion of foreigners impeded the success of such initiatives. The consequences of this lack of cross-cultural empathy were emphasized in a dumb-show sequence (repeated throughout the production), in which several actors dressed in rags shuffled across the stage. They were the new underclass: traders who had nothing to sell, shop owners forced to leave their premises, and migrants who had traveled from the east to the big cities (Ankara, Istanbul) in the west in search of work, but found nothing available. Nothing—not even hope—could sustain them now; their hopeless expressions suggested that all they had to look forward to now was a painful half-life in poverty. In Erdenk’s production, politicians were clearly to blame for this crisis. This was suggested through quasi-Brechtian techniques; for example, by having the actors periodically step out of their roles, turn toward the audience, and comment on what they had just performed. They accused several ministers of siphoning off public funds into their bank accounts, while claiming in their public utterances that they were working in the public interest. One actor stressed that such hypocrisy is not just characteristic of Turkish politicians; recent media revelations show [End Page 105] that similar practices exist the world over. What happens in contemporary Turkey is a microcosm of the situation in other countries, whether in the West or elsewhere. Click for larger view View full resolution The Van State Theatre Company in Crazy World. (Photo: Yaşar Santoprak.) To strengthen the production’s sociopolitical purpose, Erdenk deliberately discouraged audience identification with the characters onstage. This was evident on several occasions, when the actors interrupted the performance to deliver long, mock-Petrarchan speeches in praise of courtly love, laced with lyrical metaphors and aphoristic reflections. There seemed no particular reason for them to do this other than showing off. The same also applied to the musicians, who sat just to the right of the stage playing a variety of tunes: Spanish dances, Turkish folksongs, and satirical poems delivered in Sprechstimme (“speech-voice,” or a melody spoken at an approximate pitch, not sung). They began to play at inopportune moments—during the middle of a dramatic speech, for example—in a brazen attempt to solicit our attention. Although this strategy irritated...

From the Great Reform to the Post-dramatic: Adaptation in the Polish Postwar Theatre

The adaptation of literature not originally written for the stage into plays is extremely popular in present-day Polish theatre, and has evolved from roots in the Great Theatre Reform of the early twentieth century into a more avant-garde form than is typically seen in Anglophone theatre. The Great Reform notion of the director as auteur of a theatrical production is connected with theatrical adaptation, and was popularized in Poland by Leon Schiller, the founder of the directing department at the state theatre academy. In the early postwar era, Mieczysław Kotlarczyk’s influential Rhapsodic Theatre also produced adaptations of many classic works of prose and epic poetry. Starting in the 1960s, student theatres as well developed their own special variety of adaptation, and Grotowski and Kantor also freely adapted literary works in avant-garde productions that served their own directorial visions. By 1989, both mainstream and alternative theatres had developed adaptation into a tool that was often used to mount productions that criticized the Communist regime. After 1989, Krystian Lupa and his students have continued to adapt literary works less for political reasons than to make personal or artistic statements. Modernist fiction and postmodern mash-ups now fuel the post-dramatic stage adaptations that flourish on the Polish stage today.

Heritage received and multiplied: Russian art libraries as collectors and translators

The librarians of two important theatre libraries in the Russian Federation – the Russian State Art Library and the St. Petersburg State Theatre Library – here outline the histories of their institutions and give an idea of the coverage and use of their collections. They discuss how they are tackling the problems of preserving their unique material, much of it iconographic, and the principles by which they select contemporary acquisitions. They also consider the challenges and benefits posed by digital material.

Review of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (adapted and directed by Dominic Leclerc) at the Open Air Theatre, London, 30 July 2008, and Füsun Ataman Berke's Bir Yaz Masalı/A Summer's Tale (directed by Cahit Çağıra for the Ankara State Theatre) at the Little Theatre, Ankara, 19 March 2009

The governing principle behind both these revivals was accessibility, as the respective directors sought to render Shakespeare's texts accessible to audiences of all ages. One was incorporated into...

RESURRECTING SIZWE BANZI IS DEAD (1972–2008): JOHN KANI, WINSTON NTSHONA, ATHOL FUGARD, AND POSTAPARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA

On 30 June 2006 at the annual National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, South Africa, two giants of South African protest theatre, John Kani and Winston Ntshona, performed as the original cast of the landmark struggle drama Sizwe Banzi Is Dead (1972). The revival marked the first production of the play in over twenty-five years. After its brief stint at the National Arts Festival (30 June–5 July 2006), the play transferred to the Baxter Theatre in Cape Town (11 July–5 August) and then entertained a monthlong run at the State Theatre in Pretoria (17 August–17 September). After its turn at the State, the production stopped shortly at the Hilton College Theatre in KwaZulu Natal (19–23 September) before settling into an extended engagement at Johannesburg's Market Theatre (28 September to 22 October). In March 2007, the original cast revival of Sizwe traveled to the British National Theatre before finally ending its tour at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in April 2008.

Marble bowing: comparative studies of three different public building facades

The veneer cladding of the Oeconomicum (OEC, Göttingen), the State Theatre of Darmstadt (STD, Darmstadt) and of the State and University Library (SUB, Göttingen) is characterised by pronounced bowing after a short time of exposure. Direct comparison of bowing data related to measurements from 2000 to 2003 at the SUB clearly show that the amplitude in bowing had significantly increased. The bowing is different in intensity and orientation (concave, convex). The cladding material (Peccia marble, Rosa Estremoz marble and Carrara marble) are different in lattice preferred orientation, grain size distribution and grain interlocking. Depending on the bowing, panels may show cracks mostly initiated at the dowels. The percentage of visible cracks and breakouts increases with the amplitude of bowing except for the STD. Repetitive heating–cooling under dry conditions leads to considerable inelastic residual strain only after the first or second thermal cycle. The residual strain continuously increases again if water is present, whereby the moisture content after a thermal cycle has a certain impact on the decay rate. The water-enhanced thermal dilatation strongly correlates with the deterioration rate obtained from the laboratory bow test. Detailed petrophysical investigations provide evidence that with increasing bowing a decrease of mechanical properties (flexural strength or breaking load at dowel hole) occur. Marble degradation is also connected with the increase in porosity and a general shift of the maximum pore radii to larger pore sizes. On-site damage analyses were combined with laboratory tests of the bowing potential to constrain factors that may influence the risk failure. The experimental bowing data clearly demonstrate that after 40 heating cycles combined with the effect of moisture a certain impact on the decay rate is observed. In the case of demounted panels the bowing tests show that already strongly deformed panels from the building exhibit a lower bowing potential than those with lower amplitudes of bowing. This is not the general case for all marble types. Finally, the artificial bowing causes a significant reduction of the flexural strength and the breaking load at the dowel hole. The strength loss of the experimentally aged claddings combined with on-site damage analyses led to conclusions concerning risk assessment and the predicted lifetime of the investigated marble claddings.

Intercultural Theatre? A Streetcar Named Desire on the Turkish Stage

The controversial theory of intercultural performance covers a wide range of theatrical practices, which intend to adapt subject matter and situations from one culture to another. This intention mainly involves a transportation and translation of elements and perspectives across cultures. The translator, the audience or reader, and the director fill in the gaps that are formed during this transportation and translation with their own interpretations, in accordance with the culture they inhabit. However, intercultural performance requires conscious attempts to merge two different cultures. Such attempts should not be done solely for the ‘target’ culture's audience but should also regard the perceptions of the ‘source’ culture as much as possible. In light of this, Turkish State Theatre's director Ferdi Merter's production of A Streetcar Named Desire is analysed in order to locate the distinct changes the Turkish interpretation of the play has incorporated.

Rainer Werner Fassbinder and the German Theatre by David Barnett

298 Reviews experience as theprecondition forcomplex questions of how life is transformed into art and atwhat cost. Sara Lennox forcefully reminds us of theCold War context of the Todesarten texts and analyses the female protagonists as 'captives of hegemonic ideologies' (p. 237), unable to comprehend their situation. It behoves the feminist scholar to change theworld thatproduced themurderous social relations thatBach mann describes. Finally Iwould like tomention Sebastian Kiefer's challenging ana lysisofBachmann's early poetry as 'arrangierteRauschmomente in fremdenZungen' (p. 2 I8). He argues that theauthor's shift toprose demonstrates her increased aware ness of theneed fordistance ifherwriting was not to fall into cliched representations of 'Augenblicksverziickung'. Overall this is a thought-provoking collection of essays. UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON STEPHANIE BIRD Rainer Werner Fassbinder and the German Theatre. By DAVID BARNETT. (Cambridge Studies inModern Theatre) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2005. Xii+30? pp. /5O. ISBN 978-0-52I-85514-3. Since his death in i982, and particularly since unification in I990, there has been growing interestwithin theworld of theatre in Fassbinder the playwright and the atrical director, as opposed to his better-known work as a film-maker. As David Barnett points out, however, this is an area thathas been woefully neglected by com mentators. Barnett's study admirably fills this gap in Fassbinder scholarship. The book begins by painting a picture of the West German theatre system,which, as the author notes, was the envy of the Western world because of the exceptional level of public funding it received (and indeed continues to receive post-unification) as well as its regional diversity. By the I960S, however, the systemwas, like somuch ofWest German society, being questioned by a post-war generation which was unwilling to accept what it saw as the continuation ofNational Socialist authoritarian structures into the FRG. In the theatre thismanifested itself in the counter-cultural challenge of theKellertheater, which questioned the hegemonic position of the state theatres' Intendanten. It is onto this scene that Fassbinder enters 'stage leftish' (p. 30) as a member of action-theater, forwhich he firststaged a number of plays thatwould later be reworked as films (Der amerikanische Soldat, Katzelmacher). He also forged there important alliances with Peer Raben and Hanna Schygulla, beforemoving on to found his own company, themore radical antiteater. Then, at the turnof the decade, we findhis reputation growing and with ithis integration into themainstream, cul minating inhis taking over of Frankfurt's Theater am Turm forone season in I974. However, fromBarnett's account it is clear that thiswas never a comfortable pro cess, since the collectivist principles ofMitbestimmung thathe developed during his timewith the antiteater became increasingly difficult to sustain as he was forced to understand the constraints thatbudgetary limitations place on art. The fascinating story of Fassbinder's life in the theatre,meticulously pieced to gether from thewealth of archival material now available through the Fassbinder Foundation, aswell as a remarkable array of interviewswith all thekey protagonists, isplaced against a detailed and sophisticated reading of all hismain theatricalworks. Here Barnett offersboth a series of analyses of the individual textsand, more impres sively, a very convincing evaluation of Fassbinder's place within twentieth-century European drama, highlighting his post-Brechtian aesthetic, which rejects the explo ration of thepsychological motivation of his characters, preferring instead toexamine themeta-theatrical mechanics of performance, defining his figures as unstable 'social being[s] in constant interactionwith a set of changing circumstances' (p. 254). Par ticularlyworthy ofmention in this regard isBarnett's reading of Fassbinder's most MLR, 103. 1, 2oo8 299 controversial text,Der Mull, die Stadt und der Tod, a play that continues to cause scandal by itsportrayal of 'The Rich Jew'.While Barnett gives a full account of the debate that surrounded the firstfailed attempt to stage the play after the author's death, he goes beyond this togive a fascinating and unique examination of the text as a piece of theatre. This book is amajor achievement. It is an important addition toFassbinder scho larship and more than fulfils itsstated intention of introducing the reader 'to the im pressive diversity' of the artist's theatricalwork 'and enthus[ing] him or her enough to read theplays' (p. 262). My one slight complaint is theuse...

Increasing returns to information and survival of Istanbul public theatre plays

In this article, we analyse the size and rank relationship for two administratively different public theatres, city and state, in Istanbul along with survival probabilities. We find returns to information for Istanbul public theatre plays. We present a comparison of our findings with related literature on Turkish state plays and Broadway shows. We find that the number of performances exhibits a lot less variation in centralized systems. Duration analysis reveals that run length of state theatres is larger than city theatres. This is an indication of greater accountability of city theatres as compared to state theatres.

The Joyous Entry of Casimir I and IV into Lithuanian and Polish Cities

This article uses published and unpublished material to examine the entry of Casimir Jagiellończyk into various towns in Poland and Lithuania. Royal entry ceremonial demonstrated the social contract between the lord and his subjects: his legitimate and accepted position as dominus naturalis, his respect for his subjects’ liberties, and in return his subjects’ loyalty to their prince and acceptance of his legitimacy. There is a general format to entrees royales throughout Europe. The ceremonial has recognised overtones of religious ceremonial and the selection of dates for making a solemn entry was also connected with religious festivities. Lithuanian and Polish models are similar, as we would expect. Vilnius became a deliberate re-creation of Cracow with much centring on the Stanisław cult in the castle church-cathedral. However, Lithuania was not blocked out by Poland in this state theatre. Ceremonial under Casimir illustrates the diversity and unity of his realms. There is a colour for all participants – usually red with gold embroidery, sometimes green or indeed brown or black. However, just as Princess Jadwiga’s golden carriage with the shields of Poland and Lithuania represented both the Kingdom and the Grand Duchy, so the style of clothing of her Polish, Lithuanian and Tatar retinue was distinctive and noticeably varied. Even the breed of horses ridden by members of an entry retinue could differ – but not in an uncontrolled way. Despite the fact that Lithuanian and Polish practice does not follow the French model exactly, it is part of a general European political culture.