Curtain Rising - Index

Curtain Rising - Curtain Rising Magazine - Volume 1, Issue 20 - September 11, 2007 - Index

Curtain Rising
September 11, 2007
NEW YORK CONTINUED
Objects of military ridicule and torture line up for more in The Brig.
No escape: The The The Brig's Brig's Brig's hyperrealisitc admonition
By Hailey Eber
Staff Writer
To attend the current production of The Brig at the
Living Theatre is a uniquely odd experience. Stairs
and cheery décor lead from the trendy, recently
gentrified Clinton Street down into the theatre,
where an impromptu café space is setup. Arriving just
minutes before the show was scheduled to begin I
was confused and wondered if the audience was to
sit in this café area throughout the play, cabaret style.
James Taylor blared from a small stereo next to a mini
refrigerator.
At 8 p.m., the posted start time for the show, the
house opened, and a curtain peeled back to reveal a
traditional seating arrangement for the audience and
Julian Beck and Gary Brackett's arresting stage design
for the show. Just feet from the front row, a huge grid
of barbed wire hung from the ceiling. Behind that lay a
Photo courtesy of the Living Theatre
strip of raw gravel, and then further back the prisoner's
bunks in a neat row, enclosed by a chain-link fence.
The actors were already on the stage, the nine prisoners
in their bunks, while a few officers chatted casually
with each other. It was hard to discern whether they
were in character or chatting about where they would
go boozing after the show. This continued for several
minutes. It was vague, casual, and, again, confusing.
Alas, the show began.
Directed by Judith Malina, who first directed the play in
1963, The Brig is a historical document of a time when
the East Village was truly bohemian and theatre was
radically political. When it was originally staged, the
play, written by a veteran who survived incarceration
in a Marine Corps brig in the 1950s, provided an
account of terrifying abuse in a military prison camp
and the frightening manner in which an individual
could be dehumanized by the system. For today's
audience, what takes place, while harshly abusive,
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