Woyzeck (NHB Modern Plays) E-Book

Georg Büchner

• Herausgeber: Nick Hern Books
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

'People like us are unhappy in this world and in the next: if we made it to heaven, we'd have to help make it thunder.' The multi-award-winning Jack Thorne, the playwright behind Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, breathes new life into Georg Büchner's Woyzeck, one of the most extraordinary plays ever written. It's 1980s Berlin. The Cold War rages and the world sits at a crossroads between Capitalism and Communism. On the border between East and West, a young soldier and the love of his life are desperately trying to build a better future for their child. But the cost of escaping poverty is high, and its tragic consequences unfold in this searing tale of the people society leaves behind. Jack Thorne's new version of Woyzeck premieres at the Old Vic Theatre, London, in May 2017, in a production starring John Boyega in the title role.

Leseprobe

Georg Büchner

WOYZECK

in a new version by

Jack Thorne

NICK HERN BOOKS

London

www.nickhernbooks.co.uk

Contents

Title Page

Original Production

Epigraph

Dedication

Characters

Prologue

Act One

Act Two

Act Three

Epilogue

About the Author

Copyright and Performing Rights Information

This version of Woyzeck premiered at The Old Vic, London, on 15 May 2017, with the following cast:

ANDREWS

Ben Batt

WOYZECK

John Boyega

YOUNG WOYZECK

Carlo Brathwaite

MAGGIE/MOTHER

Nancy Carroll

DOCTOR MARTENS

Darrell D’Silva

MARIE

Sarah Greene

YOUNG WOYZECK

Reuel Guzman

GDR CITIZEN/ENSEMBLE

Isabella Marshall

YOUNG WOYZECK

Cyrus Odukale

CAPTAIN THOMPSON

Steffan Rhodri

LANDLORD/ENSEMBLE

David Rubin

EAST GERMAN SOLDIER/ENSEMBLE

Theo Solomon

Director

Joe Murphy

Designer

Tom Scutt

Lighting Designer

Neil Austin

Sound Designer

Gareth Fry

Composer

Isobel Waller-Bridge

Movement Director

Polly Bennett

Illusion

Ben Hart

Fight Directors

Rachel Bown-Williams

Ruth Cooper Brown

Casting Director

Jessica Ronane

CDG

The author’s proceeds from sales of this book and amateur licensing of the play will be donated to Young Minds, the charity committed to improving the emotional wellbeing and mental health of children and young people in the UK. youngminds.org.uk

‘The present period of history is one of the Wall. When the Berlin one fell, the prepared plans to build walls everywhere were unrolled. Concrete, bureaucratic, surveillance, security, racist, zone walls. Everywhere the walls separate the desperate poor from those who hope against hope to stay relatively rich. The walls cross every sphere from crop cultivation to health care. They exist, too, in the richest metropolises of the world. The Wall is the front line of what, long ago, was called the class war.

…The choice of meaning in the world today is here between the two sides of the wall. The wall is also inside each one of us. Whatever our circumstances, we can choose within ourselves which side of the wall we are attuned to. It is not a wall between good and evil. Both exist on both sides. The choice is between self-respect and self-chaos.’

John Berger, 2004

For Cathy Mason

Characters

WOYZECK [Voy-tzeck], British, early twenties

MARIE, Irish Catholic, early twenties

ANDREWS, British, late twenties/early thirties

MAGGIE, British, early forties

MOTHER, British, early forties

CAPTAIN THOMPSON, British, forties

DOCTOR MARTENS, German, forties

YOUNG WOYZECK, British, ten

Also SINGER, GDR CITIZEN, EAST GERMAN SOLDIER, LANDLORD

MAGGIE and MOTHER need to be played by the same actress.

All other parts played by members of the company, in particular that marked SINGER – who can and will be played by multiple people.

Setting

The play is set in Berlin in 1981.

This ebook was created before the end of rehearsals and so may differ slightly from the play as performed.

Prologue

A little boy walks out on to stage. He is YOUNG WOYZECK.

He looks down on the floor.

He starts to chalk it out.

He continues this as the audience enter.

As he chalks it, things start to appear.

Around him and behind him.

And then a SINGER appears behind him – with the house lights still up – and opens their mouth and starts to sing.

And as they sing so things are built and transformed and grow.

SINGER.

The sun had set behind yon hills,

Across yon dreary moor,

Weary and lame, a boy there came

Up to a farmer’s door

‘Can you tell me if any there be

That will give me employ,

To plough and sow, and reap and mow,

And be a farmer’s boy?

My father is dead, and Mother is left

With five children, great and small;

And what is worse for Mother still,

I’m the oldest of them all.

Though little, I’ll work as hard as a Turk,

If you’ll give me employ,

To plough and sow, and reap and mow,

And be a farmer’s boy.

And if that you won’t me employ,

One favour I’ve to ask, –

Will you shelter me, till break of day,

From this cold winter’s blast?

At break of day, I’ll trudge away

Elsewhere to seek employ,

To plough and sow, and reap and mow,

And be a farmer’s –’

MOTHER. Frank.

YOUNG WOYZECK runs offstage.

ACT ONE

Scene One

A simple bedroom. MARIE and WOYZECK lie barely dressed on the bed. MARIE is Irish and speaks with an Irish accent, WOYZECK is English and speaks with an English accent. Their German pronunciation is terrible, but it tries hard.