Brechtian Acting

In the past I have studied Drama GCSE and Drama & Theatre Studies A.S. Level. My favourite practitioner (and the one that was favoured by the college I went to) is Brecht. I will do a brief back story.


Drama had been about being as realistic as possible, making people believe in what was happening on stage, letting them get lost in the story and not challenging them at all. People went to the theatre to enjoy themselves, it was reserved for the bourgeoisie (the ruling class). 


Brecht wanted to change that. He believed that theatre should be for everybody. He also believed that theatre should be used to challenge people, to question their morality, to highlight political issues, injustice and other wrong doings. He also broke down the fourth wall (the invisible one between the audience and the actors on stage, separating the audience from the action and them being involved). He believed that people should be aware that they are watching a play at all times, and not drawn in to the story and believing it was a state of reality, allowing them to remain objective and pick up on the plays message.


Several techniques were used by him, by others following his style now and have also been developed (with new technology etc) by those trying to direct/act in the Brechtian style. Firstly Set and costume is kept to a minimum, perhaps just changing one item to denote the character being played (actors may also play more then one character - reminding the audience they are actors), set again may be denoted by just a couple of items, or a backdrop (and in recent times a computer projected image). Actors may change on stage from one character to the next - showing that they are actors and not the people they are playing once again. The language used is colloquial and easily understood by the lower classes, the price is also affordable - famously with the Threepenny Opera (which cost a Threepenny to see). When it is thought the audience is perhaps likely to start becoming emotionally involved in the play, through sympathy with a certain character etc a song is often used to break this, allowing the audience to remain objective. 


The Verfremdungseffekt (or V-effekt) is used to describe the action being made strange, alien, detached to stop the audience from identifying with a character, to allow them clarity of thought. The characters in his plays were meant to represent a type of person, rather then an individual character. Questioning the roles of different types of people within society, Archetypes are often used to represent these. Also the person acting should not try to become the character but rather portray them i.e. they are not trying to get into the mind set of the character, as with other styles of acting but rather show what has been said, done etc. It is more of a narrative of the character then an impersonation. Getus - over acting, large actions are used by actors, again this show that they are not trying to impersonate a character, it also adds to the archetypes - over acting of typical mannerisms etc may be used. 


He also believed that only bright lighting (which source could clearly be seen my the audience) should be used, as lighting to create mood would be too suggestive to an audience. His plays always had a political or social motive to their meaning questioning the roles and actions of the ruling class and their dominance over the rest of society. He points out injustice, fraud and other wrong doings. Sadly his plays are as relevant today as they were when written (as I found out when doing the Threepenny Opera, a closing dialogue was written summarising the points of the play using examples from the news of the previous 12 months)


There is much more I could talk about, it is almost endless. However I feel I have outlined some of the main points. I love the style and also really like the fact that there is always a political point attached to his plays. In some ways I feel he was the equivalent of the Dada movement in theatre. 


I am going to look at ways to include some Brechtian style techniques in my visual work. Apparently it may be more relevant for the next college brief, however I wanted to write down my thoughts now as they came to me. 


I got the information for this from past experience and also here