Moritat

By T.E. Kalem

A KURT WEILL CABARET

The chemistry of kindred souls engineers a rare alchemy in the theater. Put Colleen Dewhurst and Jason Robards together in a Eugene O'Neill play under the direction of Jose Quintero and something memorable occurs. The affinity of feeling between the creator and the re-creators actually propels the drama into a new dimension of the spirit. That happened with the trio's revival of A Moon for the Misbegotten, a flawed play that may never seem so moving again.

Something similar occurs when Martha Schlamme and Alvin Epstein sing the Berlin and Broadway songs of Kurt Weill, as they are now doing at Manhattan's Bijou Theater. Singing is a singularly inadequate word; reincarnation is distinctly more appropriate. When these two are onstage, the audience is inside the skulls and the sensibilities of Weill and his most potent collaborator, Bertolt Brecht. One immediate impression is that the lyricist always has an enormous impact on the composer. Rodgers and Hart is light-years away from Rodgers and Hammerstein. In like fashion, Pirate Jenny of Brecht's Threepenny Opera dwells in a totally different realm from The Saga of Jenny of Lady in the Dark with lyrics by Ira Gershwin ("Jenny made her mind up when she was three/ She, herself, was going to trim the Christmas tree./ Christmas Eve she lit the candles --tossed the taper away./ Little Jenny was an orphan on Christmas Day").

To be transported in a time machine to a different tonality of mood, one has only to listen to Moritat (Ballad of Mack the Knife). Datelined 1928, here is the authentic shiver of Nazi gangsterism stalking the streets of doom. All the great numbers follow -- Alabama-Song, Surabaya Johnny, Bilbao Song, Ballad of the Pimp and the Whore. In all these songs, a caustic social vision is wedded to a winningly expansive lyricism. This Cabaret is a feast for Broadway.

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