{"id":3630,"date":"2025-04-11T12:21:35","date_gmt":"2025-04-11T12:21:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/04\/11\/observer-opera-reviews-the-berliner-ensembles-threepenny-opera\/"},"modified":"2025-04-11T12:21:36","modified_gmt":"2025-04-11T12:21:36","slug":"observer-opera-reviews-the-berliner-ensembles-threepenny-opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/04\/11\/observer-opera-reviews-the-berliner-ensembles-threepenny-opera\/","title":{"rendered":"Observer Opera Reviews: The Berliner Ensemble\u2019s \u2018Threepenny Opera\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Constanze Becker, Maeve Metelka and Tilo Nest. Photo Richard Termine<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If Jonathan Jeremiah Peachum stepped out of The Threepenny Opera<\/i>\u2014Die Dreigroschenoper<\/i> for the Herkunftssprechers\u2014and into our world, he would probably be some kind of social media charity consultant. For a fee (and percentage), he can tell you what spin to put on your GoFundMe pleas to cover your medical bills. Peachum would know, as he does in Bertolt Brecht<\/a> and Kurt Weill<\/a>\u2019s early masterpiece, that sympathy in an attention economy is easily lost. These days, it takes an LLC just to beg for your bread.<\/p>\n

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Die Dreigroschenoper<\/i> was John Gay<\/a>\u2019s Beggar\u2019s Opera<\/i> for Berlin in the late 1920s. It\u2019s a testament to how little things have fundamentally changed that the Dreigroschenoper<\/i> for New York in the late 2020s is still just The Threepenny Opera. <\/i>Looking down the barrel of a possible recession and an ever-widening wealth gap, the parallels are all too easy to see. Luckily, Barrie Kosky<\/a>\u2019s Berliner Ensemble production\u2014at BAM for a limited run of performances\u2014doesn\u2019t put too fine a point on these resonances, instead delivering a slick, glam and very funny show in a contemporary-cum-Weimar setting. Elaborate scaffolding takes up almost the entirety of the stage, with glittery black tinsel both in front and behind. The set recalls Art Deco wallpaper: stairs and mazes create rigid, geometric forms that you get stuck in and have to weasel out of. It calls for clambering, slithering and all-around athletic derring-do from the cast, especially its central character, the anti-hero arch-criminal Macheath.<\/p>\n

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SEE ALSO: Barrie Kosky On Why \u2018The Threepenny Opera\u2019 Still Cuts Deep <\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Berliner Ensemble was founded by Brecht himself and his wife, Helene Weigel<\/a>, who became the company\u2019s artistic director, and they have all the bonafides to revive one of Brecht\u2019s most popular works: a long history with the piece, a strong cast and some excellent musicians. Weill\u2019s sleaze-classical-dancehall score sounded remarkably lucid under Adam Benzwi<\/a>\u2019s direction, highlighting the numerous musical jokes from the fake arias to the fake Bach chorales. The entire performance was a clarified cocktail that went down with ease. We open with the most famous tune, \u201cDie Moritat von Mackie Messer\u201d (\u201cMack the Knife\u201d), here sung by a character called \u201cThe Moon over Soho,\u201d in a cute take on the traditional street-singer and glitter-capped Josefin Platt<\/a>\u2019s smoky, consonant-chewing delivery established the vocal mood.<\/p>\n

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Gabriel Schneider as Mackie Messer. Photo: Richard Termine<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Die Dreigroschenoper<\/i> is an opera where the singing\u2014the quality thereof, I mean, not the fact of the songs\u2014doesn\u2019t matter in the least. What does matter is the flair with which the lines are delivered and the individuality and expressiveness of the actors\u2019 voices. On that front, this cast mostly exceeded the task, with sharply drawn comedic characterizations and some rather excellent performances.<\/p>\n

After a wonderful introduction to Jonathan Jeremiah Peachum (Tilo Nest<\/a>, razor-sharp in a double-breasted suit) and the opera\u2019s themes\u2014poverty, cynicism, the threadbare morality of the upper classes\u2014we finally meet Macheath, whose wedding to Polly Peachum (Maeve Metelka<\/a>, gleeful and game) incites the interpersonal conflict of the whole show.<\/p>\n

As Macheath, Gabriel Schneider<\/a> is lithe and wiry, with a violent poise and sleazy showmanship that makes him riveting. He has an acrobat\u2019s command of his body, able to create shapes, and a nice voice, to boot. The beginning of the second act felt longer for his absence. Metelka\u2019s Polly is a good match for him\u2014she sold \u201cSeer\u00e4uber Jenny\u201d with aplomb\u2014but her role simply has less flair after the fireworks-laden numbers of the first act.<\/p>\n

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Gabriel Schneider and Bettina Hoppe. Photo: Richard Termine<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Apart from Schneider, who was in a class of his own, the other best-in-show may have to go to Kathrin Wehlisch<\/a>, in drag as Tiger Brown, a corrupt police chief and former war buddy of Macheath\u2019s. From Wehlisch\u2019s splayfooted walk to her raspy harrumphs to her penciled-in mustache, she was a master of physical comedy. The final bit, where she attempts to feed Mackie his final meal of flaccid asparagus, delivered on a creaky cart, was a tasty morsel of comic gold.<\/p>\n

Constanze Becker<\/a>\u2019s Celia Peachum was another valuable player; she was sultry, cruel and entertainingly world-weary, her long face and black-rimmed eyes like a Modigliani painting come to life as a dominatrix. Her scenes with Tilo Nest, including a tongue-waggling bit straight out of Rocky Horror Picture Show, <\/i>were tiny triumphs. Bettina Hoppe<\/a>, as Macheath\u2019s other former lover and prostitute Ginny-Jenny, had a welcome soulfulness\u2013her character is the only one who experiences anything like moral conflict\u2013but her Salomonsong required either a stronger voice or a more creative staging from Kosky.<\/p>\n

Laura Balzer<\/a>\u2019s Lucy Brown was the most outr\u00e9, replete with shrieks, growls and chitters and a neon outfit that made her seem like a demented Furby or a psychotic sentient gumball machine. The performance was thoroughly amusing until it became overly broad.<\/p>\n

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Threepenny Opera, Berliner Ensemble. Photo: Richard Termine<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Kosky has a sharp eye as a director, especially when working on the scaffolding. Without it, the direction lost a bit of focus. Too many numbers were simply parked and barked, like Ginny-Jenny\u2019s and Lucy\u2019s in Act II. Despite a dragging second act, the final scenes covering Mackie\u2019s execution were both funny and poignant, giving Schneider one more chance to show off his vast emotive and comedic skill set. But lest you feel too much for the lovable rascal, Kosky brings down an illuminated sign reading \u201cLOVE ME\u201d in a pitch-perfect moment that catapults the opera into the age of millennial faux-joking desperation and refuses any emotion that isn\u2019t at least self-aware in its theatricality.<\/p>\n

Brecht and Weill draw from an unending (and earned) well of cynicism only to arrive at strange sympathy, one where manipulators and the manipulated know what\u2019s going on. They certainly knew that the theater is not life\u2014the fake-out ending says so\u2014but survival often requires theater. After all, even an artfully ironic plea for help still expresses a sincere need.<\/p>\n

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