The Deadbeat Opera
The Pump House, 544 Tuam St, Christchurch
06/09/2024 - 21/09/2024
Production Details
Direction – Peter Falkenberg
Design – Stuart Lloyd-Harris
Production – Marian McCurdy
development collaborator - Samantha Boyce-Da Cruz
Free Theatre Christchurch
“There are some who are in darkness / And the others are in light / And you see the ones in brightness / Those in darkness drop from sight” – Mack the Knife
Ladies and gentlemen, we’re rolling up to the Pump House with another miserable tale!
Following on from the success of Woyzeck we present to you the premiere of a low-life, low-budget opera performed by a highly talented cast of losers and deadbeats.
The Deadbeat Opera is Free Theatre’s adaptation of John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera (1728) a revolutionary and then immensely popular ‘anti-opera’ and forerunner to the modern-day musical where criminal gang leaders and prostitutes sung well known songs (by Johann Pepusch) and folk ballads about corruption, poverty and injustice and Bertolt Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera (1928) an adaptation 200 years later of Gay’s work with new music in the form of cabaret songs composed by Kurt Weill.
In Brecht’s adaptation he reverses the moral positions of the bankers and police with that of the beggars and thieves: “Who is the greater criminal: he who robs a bank or he who founds one?” He also wanted to show that high moral standards are only possible when one can afford them: “Food is the first thing, morals follow on”.
The Deadbeat Opera juxtaposes our current period of the 2020s with the historical periods of Gay and Brecht – the early days of the Industrial Revolution during the 1720s and the Great Depression during the 1920s.
Hester Ullyart performs the role of gang leader Macheath and is joined by a mix of experienced local performers – Aaron Boyce, Heather McFarlane, Sarah Clare Judd, Greta Bond, Chris Carrow and Marian McCurdy – and our gang of musicians – Reuben Derrick, Sam White, Chris Reddington and Doug Brush.
Directed by Peter Falkenberg with design by Stuart Lloyd-Harris, the heritage Pump House once again provides the perfect setting. Enjoy a beverage before the show and during the interval at our ‘Beggars and Bankers Pumphouse Bar’, where you’re guaranteed to get what you paid for.
We are performing The Deadbeat Opera in honour of our collaborator, sister and friend Samantha Boyce-Da Cruz who worked with us to develop the project last year. Sam passed away unexpectedly in February. She is very much with us in all of our thoughts and we dedicate this opera to her.
Performances:
Friday 6th Sep 8.00pm
Saturday 7th Sep 8.00pm
Tuesday 10th Sep 8.00pm
Wednesday 11th Sep 8.00pm
Thursday 12th Sep 8.00pm
Friday 13th Sep 8.00pm
Saturday 14th Sep 8.00pm
Tuesday 17th Sep 8.00pm
Wednesday 18th Sep 8.00pm
Thursday 19th Sep 8.00pm
Friday 20th Sep 8.00pm
Saturday 21st Sep 8.00pm
Location: The Pump House, 544 Tuam St
Tickets: $25/$40 https://events.humanitix.com/the-deadbeat-opera
https://www.freetheatre.org.nz/the-deadbeat-opera.html
Brown – Chris Carrow
Peachum – Aaron Boyce
Filch – Sam White
Mrs Peachum – Heather McFarlane
Matt of the Mint – Chris Reddington
Polly – Sarah Clare Judd
Macheath – Hester Ullyart
Crook Fingered Jake – Doug Brush
Bob the Saw – Reuben Derrick
Jenny – Marian McCurdy
Suky – Greta Bond
Musicians:
Reuben Derrick
Sam White
Chris Reddington
Doug Brush
Theatre , Opera , Music ,
90 mins approx
Uniformly excellent performances deliver high-impact experience.
Review by Lindsay Clark 09th Sep 2024
Poor theatre at its best, as in this latest production from the talented crowd at work in Free Theatre, is a reminder how telling a barebones performance without extravagant technology and production support can be. Less, albeit very artful less, is high impact stuff.
There could hardly be a better place for it to happen than the old brick, unlined Pump House with band and playing spaces similarly unpretentious. Nothing fancy here. Support resources as needed – such as a microphone or the odd lighting source – are undisguised and honestly treated.
This, then, is the setting for a clever compilation of perennial ballads from Brecht and Weill and contemporary pieces commenting on the ways of our world, which is still open to the charge of greed and hypocrisy that fired up original audiences. As a rousing opening, ‘The Ballad of Mac the Knife’, delivered by Chris Carrow playing a beggar, brings out the goose bumps. That shark image never fails.
We are reminded that tonight is about comedy, which of course emphasises the nastiness of smiling at the bullying and deception we’ll see in action through a string of punchy songs. In case we miss the point, captions are unrolled. The human condition is relentlessly and compellingly revealed as Polly (Sarah Clare Judd), daughter of merciless beggar king Peachum (Aaron Boyce), hooks up with suave arch villain Macheath (Hester Ullyart), setting up a whole trail of consequences.
Falkenberg’s new collage of material treats some elements of the original lightly, but there is no shortage of tension as we are carried from song to song. The traditional pardoning of Macheath (in search of a tongue-in-cheek ‘happy ending’), is freshly dealt with in a brilliant stroke which deserves no spoiler.
All this calls for absolute assurance and vocal agility to maintain the intensity of music and message. Performers and musicians are uniformly excellent, presented in stylishly tatty outfits which vividly underscore the theatricality of their doings.
Poor theatre maybe, but the experience is undeniably a rich one.
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