Photographs by Katrin Dettmer (dramaturg)
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Heiner Müller (1929-1995)
A Blog for the Brown University Production of Hamletmachine by Heiner Müller in a new translation by Katrin Dettmer and José Enrique Macián
About Me
A new translation by Katrin Dettmer and José Enrique Macián
Adaptation: José Enrique Macián
Adaptation: José Enrique Macián
The Performers:
Tamara Del Rosso
Hollis Mickey
Max Posner
Charly E. Simpson
Evan W. Smith
Sam Yambrovich
Tamara Del Rosso
Hollis Mickey
Max Posner
Charly E. Simpson
Evan W. Smith
Sam Yambrovich
Director:
José Enrique Macián
Stage Manager:
James Anglin Flynn
Scenic Designers & Construction:
Pete Fallon and Peter Scheidt
Costume Designer:
Emma Lipkin
Sound Designers:
James Hinton and Alex Kruckman
Dramaturg:
Katrin Dettmer
Lighting Designer:
Alana Jacoby
New Media Designer:
Sebastian Gallese
Choreography:
Matt Bauman
Production Manager:
Amanda Glassman
Assistant Director:
Larson DiFiori
Assistant Stage Manager:
Emily Toner
Assistant Lighting Designer:
Drew Madden
Master Electrician:
Matthew Gelfand
Electrics Crew:
Harry Aspinwall, Aubie Merrylees and Justin Spiegel
Technical Assistants:
Lou Bukiet, Oona Curley, Andrew Chin, Rebecca Mintz, Andrew Oates and Eric Rudisaile
Production Running Crew:
William Baumann, Blaine Grinna, Hadley Horning, Jina Park, Rob Ren-Pang, Daniel Ricker and Shanoor Seervai
Sock & Buskin Liaison:
Paul Meier
José Enrique Macián
Stage Manager:
James Anglin Flynn
Scenic Designers & Construction:
Pete Fallon and Peter Scheidt
Costume Designer:
Emma Lipkin
Sound Designers:
James Hinton and Alex Kruckman
Dramaturg:
Katrin Dettmer
Lighting Designer:
Alana Jacoby
New Media Designer:
Sebastian Gallese
Choreography:
Matt Bauman
Production Manager:
Amanda Glassman
Assistant Director:
Larson DiFiori
Assistant Stage Manager:
Emily Toner
Assistant Lighting Designer:
Drew Madden
Master Electrician:
Matthew Gelfand
Electrics Crew:
Harry Aspinwall, Aubie Merrylees and Justin Spiegel
Technical Assistants:
Lou Bukiet, Oona Curley, Andrew Chin, Rebecca Mintz, Andrew Oates and Eric Rudisaile
Production Running Crew:
William Baumann, Blaine Grinna, Hadley Horning, Jina Park, Rob Ren-Pang, Daniel Ricker and Shanoor Seervai
Sock & Buskin Liaison:
Paul Meier
East German playwright Heiner Müller once stated, “the only thing a work of art can do is awaken a longing for a different state of being. And this longing is revolutionary.” Brown Theatre’s production of Müller’s Hamletmachine is an exploration into a young generation’s attempt to stimulate social change while confronted by the conformity of consumerist culture. Written in 1977, Hamletmachine revisits the Western Canon’s representation of the intellectual faced with revolutionary change. Here, Shakespeare’s Hamlet is seen as a person at the threshold of two distinct eras: The movement between Ice Age and Heat Death, between the failure of real existing socialism and the accession of capitalism. In the year 2008, what marks our own transition as the Bush presidency comes to an end, when the ruins of Müller’s Europe have become the ruins of the World Trade Center?
In Müller’s fragmented eight-page text, Shakespeare’s masterpiece struggles to survive amidst the mounting rubble of literary and political history. Failed ideals and human disillusionment give way in Hamletmachine to the youth clamoring in reaction against the past in order to change the present. To break free of the continual cycle of violence within history the past is questioned and deconstructed. Moving away from psychological narrative, Hamletmachine creates a landscape of the betrayed revolution. Brown’s production challenges and provides resistance to this complicated text, inciting spectators to do the same. This performance is an exploration into the place of theatre as a site of revolutionary change. In Müller’s words, “the slogan of the Napoleonic era still applies: Theater is the Revolution on the march.”
In Müller’s fragmented eight-page text, Shakespeare’s masterpiece struggles to survive amidst the mounting rubble of literary and political history. Failed ideals and human disillusionment give way in Hamletmachine to the youth clamoring in reaction against the past in order to change the present. To break free of the continual cycle of violence within history the past is questioned and deconstructed. Moving away from psychological narrative, Hamletmachine creates a landscape of the betrayed revolution. Brown’s production challenges and provides resistance to this complicated text, inciting spectators to do the same. This performance is an exploration into the place of theatre as a site of revolutionary change. In Müller’s words, “the slogan of the Napoleonic era still applies: Theater is the Revolution on the march.”
Blog Archive
Heiner Müller (1929-1995)
More about Heiner Müller
A word from Bert Brecht
please email questions to jose_macian@alumni.brown.edu
J.E. Macián also collaborated on a production of Maurice Maeterlinck's The Blind, directed by Rebecca Schneider.
J.E. Macián also collaborated on a production of Maurice Maeterlinck's The Blind, directed by Rebecca Schneider.