Walking down the crowded streets of the East Village, one can wander past a hidden gem of dramatic theater while being bombarded by the trendy bars and eateries. Behind the heavily lacquered doors of the Theater for the New City, The Pipeline Theatre Company presented its performance of Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle, a play punctuated with religious themes, the discrepancy between social classes and a narrator who does not dictate the plot but sings to augment the dialogue of the eclectic cast of characters.
The Caucasian Chalk Circle is a play within a play, a combination of two stories about a kitchen maid named Grusha who has the seemingly unfortunate destiny of caring for an abandoned baby of royal blood and a village recorder named Azdak who plays an essential part in deciding Grusha’s fate. The performance begins with two rivaling families demanding a plot of land left deserted by the Germans after World War II. Each has specific reasons for wanting the land. The goat herders are the rightful, former owners, while the fruit farmers want to irrigate and provide food for the village. The issue is a clear-cut case and to celebrate a pleasant, logical conclusion, the fruit farmers invite a Singer to tell the group a story, the story of the Chalk Circle.
Through a series of clever set alterations and quick costume changes, we travel with Grusha as she encounters a plethora of memorable characters. Her journey begins as she escapes into the mountains with a newborn baby boy, Michael, who has been abandoned by his mother, the vain and morally corrupt Governor’s wife. To evade the Ironshirts who have helped the Fat Prince in staging an insurrection and killing the Governor on Easter Sunday, Grusha must find a safe haven amongst the rough mountain terrain. She cannot bear to leave the baby for she feels a connection with Michael and thus adopts him as her own.
Her adventure leads her to her brother, Lavrenti, who provides a temporary home for her and Michael. But after a long recovery from scarlet fever during the winter months, Grusha feels her presence in her brother’s home as a burden and reluctantly agrees to marry a ‘dying’ man named Jussup, despite her promise of marriage to a soldier back home. After the wedding ceremony alongside Jussup’s deathbed, we are soon told that the Grand Duke has raised an army to defend his country against the Fat Prince and the drafting of soldiers has ceased. Jussup magically rises from his bed upon hearing this and in an instant, Grusha is not a widow as she had hoped but a newly minted wife with a sexually demanding husband.
Two years pass and we see Grusha washing linens alongside a river as Michael, represented by a strange, disproportionate puppet, plays with the other small children. She finally encounters her soldier-fiancé, Simon, across the river and must confess she is no longer free to marry as she had once promised. Simon sees Michael and automatically assumes the child is hers. While Grusha emphatically denies his assumption about the boy, soldiers arrive and claim that the young child is the Governor’s long-lost son. In her distress, Grusha declares that Michael is her son and follows the soldiers back to her hometown.
During the next act, the Singer introduces us to our other main character, Azdak, a disheveled villager with a strong distrust for authority and a kindred connection to the poor. We flashback to the insurrection as Azdak finds himself the savior of a fugitive, the disguised Grand Duke, who is running away from soldiers seeking his death. After finding out the true identity of his brief visitor and fearful of being branded a traitor, Azdak arrives in town to have himself arrested for saving the Duke’s life. The soldiers there think his story is a hoax and is then released. Soon afterwards, the Fat Prince arrives with a nephew he wants appointed as the new judge. But what can be considered a simple twist of fate, the soldiers assign Azdak to the bench and we instantaneously see this scruffy looking man don a black robe.
During her trial, Azdak and Grusha finally meet, as one must determine the future of the other. Azdak admits he has trouble deciding which woman is Michael’s true mother. While the Governor’s wife is the biological link and must acquire her son back in order to declare her husband’s estates, Grusha is also adamant about keeping Michael, but for obvious, less selfish reasons. Torn from the biblical story of King Solomon, Azdak devises a plan to resolve who is better suited to care for the boy. A chalk circle is drawn and Michael is placed in the middle. Azdak dictates that whoever can pull the boy out of the circle first is the rightful mother.
An epic tale told in an almost three-hour span, The Caucasian Chalk Circle has, at times, the ability to dull its audience’s full attention. The cast of well-trained, young actors—the majority of whom have graduated from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts—has the right amount of talent to bring Brecht’s work to its full humorous light. The two main characters are played with notable strength and passion. But brief intermediate roles, like Jussup and the drunken monk who officiates the wedding ceremony, performed by Alex Mills and Glenn Hergenhahn respectively, are distinguished for their pitch perfect, comic timing. As a whole, you can feel the energy and chemistry among the actors, like a small family who has been in each other’s company for years and can effortlessly anticipate another member’s next move. In the end, this group achievement, rather than any particular individual performance, was rewarded with cheerful applause and a much deserved, dare I say, much needed, standing ovation.
Photos by Ahron R. Foster
The Caucasian Chalk Circle
The Pipeline Theater
By Bertoldt Brecht
Directed by Anya Saffir
Original music by Cormac Bluestone
Performed at the Joyce and Seward Johnson Theater at Theater for the New City (155 First Avenue)
Through March 19, 2011
www.pipelinetheatre.org
