Review: THE GOOD PERSON OF SZECHWAN, Lyric Hammersmith

Despite leaving an indelible mark on western theatre, Bertolt Brecht's plays seem rarer and rarer in the UK. It's not hard to see why. Never short on chutzpah, he once claimed: "Don't expect the theatre to satisfy the habits of its audience, but to change them."

Enter Nina Segal's new version of Bertolt Brecht's The Good Person of Szechwan in all its plastic, bombastic, and iconoclastic glory. It's a glimmering neon hoot from start to finish. For an eighty-year-old play about the perils of capitalism and human-nature born kicking and screaming amongst the political turmoil of Weimar Germany, it neither looks nor feels like it has aged a day.

Segal may have done the heavy lifting with her sparky script paced to perfection, but director Anthony Lau is in the driving seat balancing deftly Brecht's irreverent humour with the weighty ethical dilemmas that the German playwright is synonymous with.

Shen Te (an effervescent Amy Tredrea) is on the uppers, a kind natured sex worker always willing to "open her door" only to become a victim of a brutal world. An exploitative cabal of neighbours take advantage of her kindness until she is rewarded with a thousand dollars from three pompous gods wanting to test her morality.

The ethical paradox at its core pulsates with an electric rhythm. Lau's production is supercharged with video game-like surrealism; comically caricatured villains in gorgeously idiosyncratic costumes bumble around with cartoonish exhilaration. The set is washed in bright hot pink and the sound design echoes the 8-bit soundscapes of Nintendo.

But this is no fantasy escape. Brecht's murky morality bubbles underneath in all its vicious savagery. Desperate to survive Shen Te turns bad, adopting the guise of a moustachioed cousin, reminiscent of a certain Italian plumber, to dish out brutality to those who once sought to do the same to her. Each scene feels like a new level. New characters unlocked. Newer and crueller abilities available for use. New ways to exploit those around her. Eventually founding her own tobacco factory, the bloody cogs of capitalism are laid bare for all to see.

But where one would expect oppressive weight there is sassy levity. Brecht constantly undermines his audience's expectations to keeps us on our toes. He doesn't have the answers; by the end we are challenged to untangle the moral conundrums for ourselves. Be good, but not too good. Survive, but not at others' expense. Is there even a middle ground?

The epilogue sees a man emerge. Bespectacled and with short hair, it's not quite Brecht himself but there is a nudge-nudge-wink-wink resemblance. With a facetious glee, he admits he has no idea either and that the play has to end now because the lighting costs too much to continue. A fittingly futile final cherry on top of this exuberant tribute.

The Good Person of Szechwan runs at Lyric Hammersmith until 13 May

Photo Credit: Manuel Harlan

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