Play with music.
By Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill in collaboration with Elisabeth Hauptmann, after John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.
English adaptation by Simon Stephens.
Pre-production and post-production features on the world premiere at London's National Theatre from the Kurt Weill Newsletter.
Performance Information
Synopsis
Song List
Press Clippings
Balladeer George Ikediashi and Rory Kinnear as Macheath
from the premiere at National Theatre London, 2016.
Cast: Singing roles -- Balladeer (tenor or high baritone), Macheath (high baritone), Jonathan Jeremiah Peachum (bass baritone), Mrs. Peachum (contralto), Polly Peachum (soprano), Tiger Brown (baritone), Lucy Brown (mezzo), Jenny (mezzo), Macheath's gang: Matthias (the Shadow); Robert (the Iceman); Jimmy "Retail"; Walter (the Scholar), ensemble.
Speaking roles -- Filch, Pastor Kimble, beggars, prostitutes, Officer Smith, policemen.
Orchestra: alto sax (fl, cl, bar. sax); ten. sax (sop. sax, bn, bass cl); tpt; tbn (double bass); banjo (cello, guitar, Hawaiian guitar, mandolin, bandoneon); timp/perc (tpt 2); harmonium (celesta, piano).
Duration: full evening, 55 minutes music
Performance Rights and Rentals: USA, UK, BREV: EAMC
First Production: May 26, 2016, London, National Theatre, Rufus Norris, dir., David Shrubsole, cond.
Guide to orchestration, territory abbreviations, and publishers' symbols.
Prologue
After the overture, the Balladeer introduces the work and sings of the crimes of the notorious bandit and womanizer Macheath, Mack the Knife ("Ballad of Mack the Knife"). At the end of the song, Mack emerges from a group of prostitutes and strides across the stage.
Act I
In the shop of Jonathan Peachum ("Morning Chorale of JJ Peachum"), who controls and licenses London's beggars, equipping and training them in return for a cut of their "earnings." He enrolls a new beggar, then greets his wife, who has returned from a late night out. She learns that their grown daughter Polly, who was to have come home the previous evening, is not there. They argue over who is at fault for her absence ("'What a Twat' Song"). The scene shifts to the Savoy Hotel where Macheath and Polly are holding a reception after their wedding with his gang as attendants. The pastor arrives after some awkward banter, and the gang sings a crude "hymn" ("Wedding Song"). Polly responds with a song of her own ("Pirate Jenny"). The gang gets nervous when Chief of Police Tiger Brown arrives, but he is an old army buddy of Mack's ("Cannon Song") who has repeatedly saved him from arrest. Brown warns Mack not to interfere with the King's forthcoming coronation, but he agrees to continue to protect Mack. He exits, Mack dismisses the gang, and Mack and Polly celebrate their marriage ("Love Song"). The scene shifts to Peachum's shop, where he is reviewing the beggars and preparing them to impersonate patriotic veterans for the coronation. Polly enters and announces her marriage as her parents express dismay ("Barbara Song"); Mrs. Peachum reminds Polly of Mack's fondness for prostitutes. Hoping to shut them up, Polly reveals Mack's ties to Brown, which gives Mr. and Mrs. Peachum an idea about how to snare him. The trio meditates on the world's corruption ("First Threepenny Finale: Concerning the Uncertainty of Human Relationships").
Act II
Polly tracks down Mack on Tobacco Dock. His crimes are all over the news and she advises him to leave London. He assigns Polly the task of keeping the books for his bandit "business." The gang enters and learns Polly will be in charge; skeptical at first, they soon accept her supremacy. Mack reluctantly reveals his secret to Polly: he has compromising documents that give him power over a member of the Royal Family. At last he exits, having promised Polly he will leave London immediately ("Melodrama" and "Polly's Song"). Meanwhile Mrs. Peachum bribes the prostitute Jenny, Mack's old lover, to turn him in ("Ballad of Lust and Desire"). The gang talks things over in the brothel; then Mack enters and Jenny tells his fortune, urging him to leave now. Mack and Jenny recall their old love ("Pimp's Ballad") as Jenny signals the police outside. They raid the brothel; Mack uses one of the prostitutes as a human shield, and she is shot to death before the police can arrest him. The entire cast comes onstage to sing the "Second Threepenny Finale."
(Intermission)
Macheath is in prison ("Ballad of the Free"). Brown tells him that he had no choice but to arrest him because he didn't leave the country. After Brown exits, his daughter Lucy enters, followed almost immediately by Polly. Polly asks Mack to sign documents while Lucy insults her. The two women continue their fight ("Jealousy Duet") as Macheath abandons efforts to placate them. Mrs. Peachum enters and takes Polly away. Lucy hands Mack his knife and helps him escape. Mr. Peachum comes to the jail, explains to Brown what has happened, and forces him once again to send the police after Mack.
Act III
As Peachum prepares the beggars for the coronation, Jenny comes to the shop to demand her bribe money, which Mrs. Peachum refuses to pay. As they argue, Peachum intervenes, breaking Jenny's finger to force her to reveal that Mack is lying low in her room ("Ballad of Lust and Desire" reprise). When Brown arrives, determined to arrest Peachum and the beggars, Peachum explains that the beggars are posing as patriots for the coronation but prepared to revolt if Macheath is not hanged ("Song of Human Weakness"). Frustrated, Brown orders Mack arrested again; as he is brought to the police station, Jenny sings under a street light ("Solomon Song"). Polly and Lucy meet in the street and discover that they have some things in common. Mrs. Peachum enters and announces that Mack will be hanged. In his jail cell, Mack arranges to bribe one of the policemen ("Call from the Grave"). He begs the gang to raise the money, but they cannot; nor can Polly, who demands the compromising documents as their last hope. Mack is led to the gallows. Everyone, including Polly, tells him off, and he prepares to die ("Epitaph: Macheath Begs Forgiveness"). Then the Balladeer announces a deus ex machina. The king himself arrives to announce that Macheath has been pardoned and granted a pension ("Third Threepenny Finale"); then he takes possession of the compromising documents.
Ballad of Mack the Knife
Morning Chorale of JJ Peachum
"What a Twat" Song
Wedding Song
Pirate Jenny
Cannon Song
Love Song
Barbara Song
First Threepenny Finale: Concerning the Uncertainty of Human Relationships
Melodrama and Polly's Lied
Ballad of Lust and Desire
Pimp's Ballad
Second Threepenny Finale
Ballad of the Free
Jealousy Duet
Ballad of Lust and Desire: Reprise
Song of Human Weakness
Solomon Song
Call from the Grave
Epitaph: Macheath Begs Forgiveness
Third Threepenny Finale
"This is a bit more bloody like it . . . Top playwright Simon Stephens's filth-encrusted adaptation largely succeeds in having and eating its grubby cake; aesthetically it conjures up a grimy, crime-infested East End in a manner both nostalgic and condemnatory"
--Andrzej Lukowski, Tine Out London, May 27, 2016
"[D]irector Rufus Norris and playwright Simon Stephens have gone for broke with a staging and adaptation that convey the piece’s complexities--a larger than life parable of amoral greed, subversive sexuality and being called to account by rough justice--in a way that is frequently bonkers. A gallery of grotesques is paraded before us. If it sometimes still feels overall like a bit of a scattergun mess, each of the elements has been individually so finely tuned that we surrender to the world that is being created."
--Mark Shenton, The Stage, May 26, 2016
"Norris and his adapter Simon Stephens have worked hard to rediscover its bracingly vulgar spirit. The cheerfully sour portraits of pimps, prostitutes and sleazy urban predators remain from the original. But topical jokes about fat-cat bankers, competitive belching sequences and jaunty musical paeans to anal sex are new additions. . . . [Macheath and Brown] served together in Afghanistan, where it seems they committed secret war crimes, another timely twist added by Stephens. . . . Brecht's sarcastically upbeat ending still serves as a jarring mockery of cozy bourgeois audience expectations, especially since Stephens spices it up with an extra sizzle of blackmail and royal sex scandal."
--Hollywood Reporter, 2016
"But even if Stephens overplays the sexuality, suggesting a past liaison between Macheath and Tiger Brown, his lyrics make the right Brechtian points, such as that survival in a corrupt world requires compromise and that 'we can't have ethics that we can't afford.'"
--Michael Billington, The Guardian, May 27, 2016
Also see Die Dreigroschenoper, for original version in German.