Re: Thoughts about updating plays to a modern audience

[bingo jones]

Le 03/03/2019 à 13:29, Anson Carmichael a écrit :
> Perhaps this is more commentary than a question, but it is in regards to
> the classic play "Doctor Faustus" by Christopher Marlowe and ponders the
> necessities of altering the original work to make it relevant to a
> modern audience...
>
> Last year I saw the play "Faust" by a local theatre company. The play seems
> to be performed here and there on occasion, just not very often. The play is
> in iambic pentameter and the setting is around England in the 16th century,
> which is when it was written. Because of this, I understand the urge to
> update the play to the interests of a modern audience, but I wonder if
> rewriting a play works as often as people think.
>
> In the performance I saw, the director took from Christopher Marlowe's
> play "Doctor Faustus" and, supposedly, mixed with Goethe's "Faust" to
> create something new. It certainly was "new", but I'm not sure how I feel
> about it.
>
> In the original Marlowe version of Faust, Doctor Faustus sells his soul
> to the devil and dreams of changing the course of history with his new
> power. By the end of the play, however, he is reduced to performing
> magical amusements for the king and queen. Marlowe's point was that by
> selling his soul to the devil, Faustus was turning away from God, which
> in turn was the wellspring from which great accomplishments are achieved.
> Thus, Faustus begins the play as a great man of knowledge and by the end he
> is reduced to a kind of jester.
>
> In the version of Faust by the local theatre company, Faust just rapes
> everybody. I mean that literally. Faust sells his soul to the devil and
> his first act thereafter is find a gambler who is willing to sell his
> daughter in exchange for winnings. Then he stops a wedding to kill the
> groom and rape the bride. After that, he kills a knight who is unimpressed
> with him and has sex with a queen while the king is given loads of gold. In
> between all of this, some characters (I assume they were the Seven Deadly
> Sins) come out and talk about how Faustus is damned for his actions.
>
> This is very different from the Marlowe play. In the Marlowe play, Faustus
> shows off his power in the beginning but becomes more and more of a joke.
> Further, there are intermittent comedic scenes featuring Faustus' manservant
> who find's Faustus' book of magic and plays pranks with it on his friends.
> This meant as a comedic interlude between scenes of Faustus running around
> doing his thing. All of this is to show Faustus failing at his ambitions
> because of his erroneous assumption that gaining power would not change him.
>
> As I mentioned before, I do understand the need to put a modern spin on an
> old story. This is especially true for stories written in an old style from
> so long ago. I feel in this case, however, the director destroyed the nuance
> of the original work and replaced it with something less nuanced and even
> approaching camp. At the end of the play, the song "Sympathy for the Devil"
> by the Rolling Stones came in over the speaker system. I just had to cringe
> and how clichéd that has become. It was just hitting all the obvious notes,
> if that makes sense. On the other hand, it did receive a number of
> nominations for the production, so perhaps I'm the one out-of-step with the
> audience rather than the director and theatre company.
>
> Can anyone give any thoughts on this?


Did anybody ever answer? i am sad to see the decline of usenet!!!!