{"id":1385,"date":"2010-03-07T05:01:07","date_gmt":"2010-03-07T10:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=1385"},"modified":"2018-08-06T21:00:13","modified_gmt":"2018-08-07T01:00:13","slug":"the-beggars-opera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=1385","title":{"rendered":"The Beggar\u2019s Opera"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>
\nThe Beg\u00adgar\u2019s Opera<\/em> is a point\u00aded exam\u00adple of unpre\u00adten\u00adtious pop\u00adu\u00adlar art long out\u00adliv\u00ading the \u201cseri\u00adous\u201d works of its day. In 1728, a rather unsuc\u00adcess\u00adful Eng\u00adlish poet, John Gay, penned a satire of the upper class\u2019s taste for Ital\u00adian Opera, as well as the estab\u00adlish\u00adment pol\u00adi\u00adtics of the day (then per\u00adson\u00adi\u00adfied in First Lord of the Trea\u00adsury, Robert Wal\u00adpole). Using a klep\u00adto\u00adma\u00adni\u00adac col\u00adlec\u00adtion of Scot\u00adtish and French folk-tunes, Gay con\u00adceived a fast-mov\u00ading, tight-knit plot involv\u00ading, instead of the usu\u00adal oper\u00adat\u00adic cast of Clas\u00adsi\u00adcal heroes and deities, the whores and thieves of the Lon\u00addon slums. The log\u00adic of the plot leads inevitably to the hang\u00ading of the hero, MacHeath, but at the last minute The Beg\u00adgar (who intro\u00adduces the play and com\u00adments on the action) announces that a moral end\u00ading would demand a hang\u00ading, but, since the audi\u00adence came to see a hap\u00adpy end\u00ading instead, Macheath is to be released. This kind of tongue-in-cheek sauci\u00adness pret\u00adty much sums up the play. Gay orig\u00adi\u00adnal\u00adly intend\u00aded it to be per\u00adformed a capel\u00adla,<\/em> but the pro\u00adduc\u00ader insist\u00aded on bring\u00ading in a pro\u00adfes\u00adsion\u00adal com\u00adpos\u00ader, Johann Pre\u00adpusch, to tart it up with arrange\u00adments and an over\u00adture. It is usu\u00adal\u00adly per\u00adformed in this version.<\/span><\/p>\n

The result was enor\u00admous\u00adly suc\u00adcess\u00adful in its day, and has arguably had far more artis\u00adtic influ\u00adence than any of the high-toned dra\u00admas of the 18th cen\u00adtu\u00adry. The char\u00adac\u00adters MacHeath, Lucy, and Pol\u00adly became folk heroes. It has nev\u00ader been absent from boards for long. A Lon\u00addon West End revival in 1920 ran to 1,463 per\u00adfor\u00admances! The play\u2019s irrev\u00ader\u00adence towards the pow\u00ader\u00adful and its lam\u00adpoon\u00ading of cor\u00adrup\u00adtion and injus\u00adtice have attract\u00aded many polit\u00adi\u00adcal rebels. Gay\u2019s attempt to pro\u00adduce a sequel was sup\u00adpressed by the gov\u00adern\u00adment. Wole Soyin\u00adka adapt\u00aded it to Nige\u00adria. Vaclav Hav\u00adel pro\u00adduced a fas\u00adci\u00adnat\u00ading under\u00adground ver\u00adsion in 1975, for which every par\u00adtic\u00adi\u00adpant was harsh\u00adly pun\u00adished. Aus\u00adtralians have shift\u00aded the locale to Con\u00advict ships. A pro\u00adduc\u00adtion last year placed it in a near-future apoc\u00ada\u00adlypse. I am loathe to include in the list Bertolt Brecht\u2019s famous adap\u00adta\u00adtion, The Three-pen\u00adny Opera, since Brecht\u2019s \u201crebel\u201d cre\u00adden\u00adtials are entire\u00adly pho\u00adny (he was, in fact, a cring\u00ading sup\u00adport\u00ader of Com\u00admu\u00adnist Aris\u00adtoc\u00adra\u00adcy, and an apol\u00ado\u00adgist for oppres\u00adsion and ter\u00adror) \u2014 but that is prob\u00ada\u00adbly the most famous adap\u00adta\u00adtion, and Kurt Weil\u00adl\u2019s tunes are delightful.<\/span><\/p>\n

But far more delight\u00adful is the orig\u00adi\u00adnal. I have two per\u00adfor\u00admances: an Old Vic pro\u00adduc\u00adtion con\u00adduct\u00aded by Mal\u00adcolm Sargeant on vinyl and a 1991 pro\u00adduc\u00adtion con\u00adduct\u00aded by Jere\u00admy Bar\u00adlow. Both are good, but I pre\u00adfer the more recent one.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c<\/span>Since laws were made for every degree,
To curb vice in oth\u00aders, as well as me,
I won\u00adder we han\u2019t bet\u00adter company
Upon Tyburn Tree;
But gold from law can take out the sting;
And if rich men like us ere to swing,
\u2018Twould thin the land, such num\u00adbers to string
Upon Tyburn Tree!<\/em>\u201d \u2013MacHeath, Act III<\/span>, Air 67<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Beg\u00adgar\u2019s Opera is a point\u00aded exam\u00adple of unpre\u00adten\u00adtious pop\u00adu\u00adlar art long out\u00adliv\u00ading the \u201cseri\u00adous\u201d works of its day. In 1728, a rather unsuc\u00adcess\u00adful Eng\u00adlish poet, John Gay, penned a satire of the upper class\u2019s taste for Ital\u00adian Opera, as \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,14,947,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-bq-reading-2010","category-c-listening","category-cq-listening-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1385"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7842,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1385\/revisions\/7842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}