Arts & Events

Susannah Martin, who directed Threepenny Opera for the Shotgun Players, spoke about the satiric musical show she transplanted from Victorian London (and 1920s Weimar Republic) to the 1970s London of the Sex Pistols—and onstage in Berkeley today: 

“I wanted to do something different, make something happen,” she said. “And I wanted to try to grapple with it directly. With Threepenny Opera, as with any play that’s lasted, I didn’t want to ignore the parts that seem jarring, the contradictions, things seeming out of place, that don’t make any sense. I didn’t want those smoothed over. Those are the moments to pay special attention to, rather than to make go away.” 

It took awhile to cast Threepenny. “We knew we had to cast actors who could sing, singers who could act ... We couldn’t compromise, especially in terms of the ensemble. We knew we needed actors who could think big, had the experience to get the whole picture. We needed people who could do everything. Not only sing, but think creatively, take risks. Such a breadth of theater! Of the kinds done in the Bay Area, plus more. From musicals to the mime troupe, from ACT to nonscripted theater ... The whole cast is like that. A huge number auditioned. It took over three months to cast the show. I’ve been spoiled by this group of actors, by the choreographers, designers—beyond gifted.” 

The production’s been touted, somewhat glibly, as “punk rock.” Martin explained the thought behind what could seem like just another gimmick of anachronistic adaptation. 

“That’s where I went for it,” she said. “I wanted to use the energy of the actor like a rock star, more chaotic, frenetic—to keep people alert, not just lost in the beauty of the music. I usually pride myself on my productions being clean, but I wanted to intentionally show how gritty the world these people live in is, something productions of Threepenny often miss. I knew it wasn’t necessarily for everybody, but was what’s relevant to me. Hopefully, audiences will go there. The scenes don’t seem to jive with the songs, the sweet melodies with the harsh lyrics. It’s usually done in cabaret style or didactic, dull ... I grew up with punk rock and wanted to get some of that excitement, tap into that primal rebelliousness, maybe see the show for the first time.” 

Originally from Boston, Martin went to high school—and theater—in San Francisco. She went to New York University, moved back out to the Bay Area, where she got involved “in the fringe theater scene,” and co-founded a troupe, the Paducah Mining Company, that focused “on American work, including about poverty and homelessness.” She got her MFA in theater from Davis, and began directing freelance. Martin’s also taught at CalShakes, Marin Theatre Company and in high schools and middle schools. 

In Berkeley, Martin has directed twice before for Shotgun, The Face Project in 2004 for the Shotgun Lab series, and the critically hailed production of Bernard Shaw’s Mrs. Warren’s Profesion two years ago. Last year, she directed Harold Pinter’s Old Times for TheatreFIRST at the Gaia Center. 

About directing Old Times, Martin commented, “It was an interesting time. TheatreFIRST was between artistic directors, so to speak. I was hired to do a show someone else was due to direct, originally. The show had to be put together quickly. We got the space. I was blessed with the people I worked with, including a most phenomenal group of actors, all abstract thinkers, who dove into it with me. Something to wrap your mind around, Old Times is out of time; it jumps back and forth both in the characters’ lives and in one evening. We had to move into the nontraditional theater space of the Gaia Center fast, with a jazz nightclub next door. It was a challenge, but that lent a surreal aspect to a play about other realities, with music just floating through. Potentially, the smartest thing I did was when I first looked at the Gaia and said, clearly we’re not going to use the stage itself. [Old Times was staged on the floor, close to the audience.] There are times when a frustrating space can be the right space.” 

Martin spoke about the relation between Shaw and Brecht, “in direct address [actors breaking with character to address the audience], consciously taken up on my part, a choice I completely learned from Shaw. Both he and Brecht—who wrote about Shaw—take a completely personal political idea, the playwright’s agenda, and put it in the mouth of the actor. It’s as if Shaw was ‘onstage.’ It’s more obvious with Brecht, who talks about it more.” 

Next up for Martin is another play—probably a big influence on Shaw—in which actors address the audience in epigrammatic bons mots, Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest. She spoke about finding “the teeth” in Wilde. The play opens at the end of February, at the Town Hall Theater in Lafayette.  

“It’s a hard thing, being a freelance director and having to devise new stuff,” Martin reflected. “I’ve been really blessed and keep getting handed epic plays—a big legacy, terrifying, fantastical.”