Review: OLD WICKED SONGS at Goodwood Theatre

Reviewed by Barry Lenny, Friday 27th July 2018.

Independent Theatre is revisiting Old Wicked Songs, by Jon Marans, who is here in Adelaide during the run of this production. Independent's artistic director, Rob Croser, has, once again, directed the work, which was, no doubt, a labour of love. Written when he was only 21, Marans's play was a finalist for the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and was the Winner of the Los Angeles Drama Logue Award.

It is Vienna in 1986 and a young American pianist, Stephen Hoffman, has come to study accompaniment under Professor Schiller, but has found himself assigned to Professor Josef Mashkan for the first three months. He is angry when he finds that the Professor insists that he learn to sing Robert Schumann's famous song cycle, Dichterliebe (A Poet's Love) Op. 48, 1840, instead of teaching him the piano to help him remove the artistic block that is stifling his playing. There are sixteen songs in this beautiful cycle, setting the words of the German Poet, Heinrich Heine, from his Lyrisches Intermezzo, a verse Prologue and 65 poems, written in 1822-23. It concludes by saying that a coffin containing the "old bad songs and dreams, all his sorrowful love and suffering", will be thrown into the sea by twelve giants. The title of this play is derived from this last of the sixteen songs, Die alten, bösen Lieder (Heine no. 65).

The two men are like chalk and cheese, but they must find a way to get along and work together in spite of their differences. The Professor is in his late 50s, from the Old World, and is concerned with the meanings behind the words and th emotional aspects of performance, while Hoffman is an impatient, brash young man of 25 from the New World, more interested in the technical aspects of the music.

The play is set against the background of the elections in which former Nazi, Kurt Waldheim, became the ninth President of Austria, a position that he held until 1992. He was previously the fourth Secretary-General of the United Nations, from 1972 to 1981. During his campaign for the presidency, it was revealed that he had been an intelligence officer for the Wehrmacht in Thessalonica, Greece, during the war.

From things that he says, Stephen begins to think that the Professor, who insists on calling him Stefan, is anti-Semitic, causing another layer of resentment between them, as he reveals that he is Jewish. His visit to Dachau, in Bavaria, the first concentration camp in Germany, opened by Heinrich Himmler in 1933, heightens the tension. There is plenty of Sturm und Drang in their relationship, as well as in the song cycle.

David Roach reprises the role of the Professor, a role that brought him both critical and audience acclaim the last time this production was presented and, seeing it again now, one cannot help but notice that, this time around, he is even better. His performance is totally believable and there was something in his performance that reminded me of some of my own music teachers from my days at university. Roach convinced completely that here is a man who loves music, and teaching.

Ben Francis plays Stephen Hoffman, filling his character with angst. Like so many young people, he knows what he wants and he wants it now, and Francis embodies that in his characterisation, adding a good degree of petulance and animosity. He gives Roach that immovable object on which to work his irresistible force. His changes, as the play progresses, are carried out with great finesse.

Musical director, Mark Sandon, plays the piano offstage, which is, of course, far superior to having a recorded soundtrack. He has quite a job to do, playing like two very different pianists, and accompanying two different singers, one of whom changes over the course of the play under the influence of the other. A notable part of the musical aspect in the work is the slipping seamlessly between a professional recording of the songs, and the playing and singing of the performers, during the set changes.

Croser and Roach have, again, come up with a very fine set, and Bob Weatherly's lighting adds further impact. You only have until Saturday 4th August to see this excellent production, so don't delay.

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