Word: blitzstein
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...Marc Blitzstein...
...Cradle Will Rock, the first offering, the duplicity lies in the strange shadows the subject matter casts. Written by Marc Blitzstein in the depths of the depression. Cradle paints the struggles of infant unionism through a severe but jazzy stylization. The single piano hammers in the background as the residents of "Steeltown, U.S.A." battle the manipulations of the inexorable, cigar-chomping "Mister Mister" (David Reiffel). Mister Mister owns the factories and the town newspaper and heads the union-busting Liberty Committee, his wife bribes the preacher to fan war hysteria so steel prices will stay high, while his henchman track...
...several levels on which the play is totally triumphant. Bertolt Brecht's writing is an extraordinary synthesis of wit, imagination, political commitment, and human insight. Kurt Weill's brash, deceptively melodic music intensifies the force of the drama spectacularly. No adaptation could be more faithful than Mark Blitzstein's to the atmosphere Brecht and Weill sought to create, truer to their message or more sympathetic to their dramatic approach. But if the drama is to succeed on stage, these achievements must be equalled by the director's intelligence and the cast's performance. The Harvard Summer School Repertory Theater...
...bank to the founding of one?" he asks. A mounted messenger promptly rushes up to knight him, though Brecht reassures us that real life would not have come out so happily. We are left with Weill's corrosive tunes and a second-act reminder that shines through Marc Blitzstein's generally smooth translation: "For even honest men may act like sinners, unless they've had their customary dinners...
September Song's first section consists of a large chunk of Threepenny Opera. The cast-does a fairly good interpretation of this masterpiece of the Brecht-Weill collaboration, although Marc Blitzstein's creaky English translations, especially of "How to Survive" and "Pirate Jenny," are beginning to show their age. Blitzstein's lyrics do not fit the rhythm of the music as well as they should, and it may well be time for someone to try his hand at a new version. Blitzstein's "Mack the Knife," of course, will never be replaced, but the rest of his songs are uneven...