Brecht

- born in 1898 in Germany

- served in the first world war before moving to Munich and then to Berlin to pursue theatre

- became a statelessness citizen in 1933 when the Nazis came to power in Germany

- moved to US in 1941 and then back to Europe in 1947

- died in 1956

Mother Courage and Her Children

- set in 1600s

- relevant to contemporary society and regarded as finest anti-war play

Fear and Misery of the Thrd Reich

- overtly anti-facist and analyses the insidious way the Nazis came to power

Chinese Theatre

- infleunced by their abilty to acheive alienation 

- how they could distance themselves from the roles they were playing

e.g. Mai Langfang - stylised, minimal and simple

Karl Marx

- wanted spectators to experience literal process of the play

- revealed stage elements, helped develop alientaion theory

- believed working class could revolutionize society

Charlie Chaplin

- theory of Gestus was influenced by silent moves and critical distance between the actor and his role

Wanted to make audiences think about what they were watching

- belived they hung up their 'brains with their hats in the cloakroom'

Brecht was against cathartic theatre - when an audence cries for a character or feels emotion through the events happening to them

- belived they lost the ability to think and judge

- wanted audiences to remain objective and distant from emotion to make rational judgments and considerations

He formed Epic Theatre

Wanted his spectators to remain interested and engaged but he wished to avoid emotional investment

- made his audience consider varying viewpoints of an argument

Epic theatre breaks the fourth wall so that spectators are an active part of the theatre

Brechtian devices

- narration, third person narration, speaking stage directions, directly adressing the audience, placards, multi-roling, split-role, minimal set, symbolic props, simple lighting

Spass

- realised that while we laugh, we think

- message may be serious but he found comedic ways of portraying it

- used to break tension to stop audience become emotionally attached to character

Gestus

- clear character gesture or movement to capture a moment or attitude

- didnt want his charatcers on stage only to show them as a type of person

Epic theatre - the idea of objectivity and absence of empathy

- narrative starts and ends, leaving issues unresolved, confronting audience with questions

- scenes are episodic - stand alone and constrcuted in small chunks

- fractured narrative - non-linear and jumps around

- shows an argument - clear political statement