kvetch
|
I fear his
wrath living
alone like a monk with a cat he's ashamed of me. I do what I can but I'm afraid all the time you have to take risks
I just want to bury myself in sleep...just want to drag sleep over me
like a sack
Chorus of the fearful
a great hanging fruit...like a melon...ready to burst |
"We all live under the shadow of the
bomb". Berkoff´s play to appeal to an American
audience failed there, but was successful in Britain.
"It's like taking your keys out 10 minutes away from
your house." Berkoff´s characters are insecure and
speak their inner thoughts as asides to the audience,
when the rest of the action is literally suspended, the
actors holding their frozen position. There are also a
couple of improvisation scenes. A very good play, deep
and insightful and like for example the best of Beckett,
it is also very funny (see the play to find out why
"what else do you do at nights" is so funny and
sad).
The
Messiah scenes
from a
crucif
ixion
|
my life oozes out
people love gestures- that's why they go to the theatre
too much belief
he has a way of making those with secrets feel guilty
a great crimson spray
she gave me tears
there is only one thing that tempts him - power
I will drown your mind in visions manifold
I put invention in the torturer |
Berkoff wrote The Messiah while directing
Metamorphosis in Hebrew in Israel. Years later it was
workshopped then premiered at the Edinburgh Festival in
2000. The play is a full two acts with a large
cast. It retells the crucifixion, with Christ as a sort
of Che Guevara, aware of his political power and also of
its limits and seeking a gesture, a faked rising from the
dead, to establish himself.
The Messiah has most similarities with the
Kafka plays, particularly The Trial, with its use of a
chorus and extensive use of mime. The scenery consists of
a small podium and a pole used as the cross for the
crucifixion. While it is overlong (the speech
of Caiphas could be removed), it contains some of the
best of Berkoff- Pilate washing his hands of the affair,
Satan tempting Christ. And the direction of Berkoff must
be the best he has done, Pilate walking backwards, Satan
slithering on the ground, the two Pharisees marching.
At the Edinburgh
Festival Messiah "achieved major newspaper coverage and not least
because one night Jesus went missing. Messiah has one of those
great but rare openings that can surely only come on a wing and a
prayer. This one wins/ The stage is bare. There is
silence. Jesus stands. Crucifixion looks imminent.
The disciples are behind him, a rigid row of blank faces. One
actor becomes a human sculpture. Jesus walks down the line and
moulds each body (Tony Jasper & Kenneth Pickering, Jesus Centre Stage,
chapter 5, 2010). The book manages to spell Berkoff's name three
different ways. When the actor playing Jesus went missing
Berkoff took over his role.
Also called Impressions of a Crucifixion and The
Murder of Jesus Christ
Ritual in blood or hep hep hep
God will hear your whispers as well as your shouts
your disrespect for the dead will hang you
our first martyr, our first martyr
last night the earth vomited up your crimes
the victim creates himself |
|
they issued an order condemning the entire Jewish population to
death by fire -some could have saved their lives if they had acknowledged Christianity -you see
how fair it was |
Written at the same time as Lunch but only
performed recently. "I finished my play which I
called Blood Accusation,
though at an earlier stage I decided on the odd name Hep,
Hep, Hep. This strange cry was
purported to have been uttered by the crusading knights
as they swept down on the unbelievers... funny what you
can pick up at the British Museum".
Set in 1255 two children play. One has an
accident, falls and dies, the other runs away. The child
has died in a Jewish garden and slowly but surely the
family, then the entire Jewish population of the town,
are caught as victims of anti-Semitism and greed leading
to their deaths.
All in all the play is good, but suffers in
comparison with Arthur Miller's The Crucible. The
introduction of the king into the story in Act 2 distorts
the play, making it less personal.
Sit and Shiver
|
when love is strong a man and a woman can make their bed on a
sword's blade
he had a brain... he even wrote a play
his tongue has no bones so it's loose
a skill, a piece of magic
never did he betray her with a shiksa |
Berkoff wrote
the original Sit and Shiver a long time ago but never
used it. Still with doubts he decided to update and
present it. The premiere was in the Odyssey
Theatre, Los Angeles on 27 March 2004 and the British
premiere in the New End Theatre, Hampstead, London in
June 2006. In the Hampstead version the Lear speech
was given in Yiddish.
A father has died and the
family mourn for him, as part of the Jewish Sitting
Shivah rite. Hence the title, a pun, Sit and Shiver
"it's Shivah, the Hebrew for 'seven', and so for
seven days you sit, shivah, mourn and sit on boxes so
that you should be humble and remember the person who has
passed away". The first half of the play is a
comedy with the guests arriving. At the end of the
first act a different guest arrives- one who has a
secret.
Site visitor Kari says (thanks Kari):
"I loved it, more than I
thought I would, and the audience seemed to as well. It
got a horrible lack of publicity, one sort of good review
and at least one AWFUL one... All the cast were superb
apart from one actor who was good, just not great and had
the weakest part anyhow. There were a few Kvetch-like
movement moments, could have done with more, and the move
of the setting from London to New York worked very well.
In fact it's better suited to America, and Steven
cleverly worked in the story of the Brooklyn Bridge
(remember he did that docu-drama? He became an expert on
its history!). I think the audience (on the old
side) weren't so taken with the bodily functions talk,
but they laughed loudly at all the stuff about
cooking..."
Biblical Tales
|
adam
samson
eve
moses
goliath
delilah
pharaoh
david |
Four short plays, retelling stories from the bible:
Adam & Eve, Samson & Delilah, David & Goliath and Moses & Pharaoh.
2010. In Delinquent Berkoff says as a child "I loved the stories of our past: of Abraham and Isaac,
Jacob, Joseph and his coat of many colours, the exodus from Egypt".
Matthew Clancy and Mark Frost as Pharaoh And Moses, New End Theater, London, 2010. Click on the image for the source.
Religion & Anarchy
|
adam
that dustbin of plague rats
eve
foul misuse of a word
goliath
delilah
pharaoh
weak jews... not so weak |
Five short plays
about Jews and the holocaust. The plays are Guilt, Roast,
Line-Up, How to Train an Anti-Semite and Gas.
Guilt is under 20
pages with middle aged Jewish husband and wife Henry and Polly.
The plays feature some Yiddish words: ayeyai
Roast
Line-Up is a seven
page two hander. A and B are in the line-up in a concentration
camp. Ahead people are sent by Nazi officers to the left or the
right. One direction means death. Yiddish words: alta
cucker meaning old man and shmock meaning idiot.
How to Train an
Anti-Semite is a 12 page two hander featuring Dot and Sid.
English slang: wadja is would you, outta is out of, wossat is what is
that, yourra is you are a, bung a bit of dosh is give some money, wiv
is with,
Gas is under three
pages with A, B and C in the gas chamber of a concentration
camp. Yiddish words: the prayer Shema Yisroel, Adone Elahaynu,
Adoni echod meaning Hear Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One;
boobala, kindala and popa meaning dearest, children, father.
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