Holy Cross Department of Theatre Presents Faculty-Directed ‘The Caucasian Chalk Circle’

WORCESTER, Mass. – The department of theatre at the College of the Holy Cross will present Bertolt Brecht’s 1944 masterpiece The Caucasian Chalk Circle on March 30 and 31, April 1, 6, 7 and 8 at 8 p.m. in Fenwick Theatre (O’Kane Hall). The production is directed by Associate Professor Edward Isser, chair of the theatre department. Isser is using the James and Tania Stern translation which features lyrics by W. H. Auden. This mounting will feature an original score by Eric Culver, a member of the Holy Cross music faculty. Tickets are $7 for members of the Holy Cross community and $10 for the general public. Groups of 10 or more can purchase tickets at a special rate of $5 each.

The Caucasian Chalk Circle examines the irrationality of propriety, charity and goodness in a world dominated by commerce, brute force and hypocrisy. Brecht dramatizes what happens to a good person in such an environment. A young peasant girl named Grusha saves a noble child who is being hunted by the forces of evil. In so doing, Grusha places herself in great danger and forsakes any chance for personal happiness. What will happen to the girl and the child? How can justice be delivered in a place of corruption and inequity? The play, in answering these questions, uses the devices of parable and experimental staging to make members of the audience think critically about the world in which they live. The story of the play is loosely based upon both a medieval Chinese play and the Book of Kings from the Bible. These ancient sources are augmented by equal doses of Marxism, the Marx brothers and the Broadway musical. The result is a unique work that is simultaneously entertaining, shocking and funny.

Written between 1943-44 in New York City and Santa Monica, Calif., while Brecht was in exile from Nazi Germany, The Caucasian Chalk Circle was originally intended to be a Broadway musical. Brecht had a deal with a New York producer and a movie star lined up to play the female lead, but when the script was finally delivered, the deal fell through. The Caucasian Chalk Circle violated almost every rule of American commercial theatre. It was a blistering attack on warfare, capitalism and bourgeois values - hardly commercial fare in the United States at the height of the Second World War. In 1954, Brecht directed the play in East Germany and a year later it toured to Paris, London and Moscow. The Caucasian Chalk Circle (along with Mother Courage which was had toured one year earlier) sent shock waves through the theatrical world. So-called "Brechtian Theatre" became the rage and had immense influence upon world theatre. Theatre companies as diverse as Giorgio Strehler’s Piccolo Teatro in Milan, the Royal Shakespeare Company in London, the Living Theatre in New York, and the Habimah Theatre in Tel Aviv sought to emulate the style of Brecht in their own landmark productions. Today, the aesthetics of Brecht have crept into almost all theatrical productions and ironically, have had immense influence upon the staging of Broadway musicals (everything from Cabaret, Les Miserables, Sweeney Todd, Rent, and Urinetown are replete with Brechtian devices).

The set for Holy Cross’s production is designed by William J. Rynders, associate professor in the theatre department, the lighting by theatre major Flynn S. Jebb ’06, and costumes by Kurt S. Hultgren, costume designer in the theatre department.

For more information or for press tickets, please contact Joe Mader in the theatre department at 508-793-3490 or jmader@holycross.edu.