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Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume 38, Number 19. May 29 1975

Masses and Man

Masses and Man

Ernst Toller

Ernst Toller

The Victoria University Drama Studies production for 1975 opens next week at Unity Theatre. The play is "Masses and Man" by Ernst Toller, and runs from Tuesday 5 August through to Saturday. 9 August.

Toller (1893-1939) was a German Spartacist and his plays directly reflect his concern for human suffering and revolutionary struggle. "Masses and Man" was written in 1922 while he was in prison for his part in the unsuccessful attempt to set up a soviet government in Bavaria in 1919, and has autobiographical elements related to this time. It is one of the major plays of the expressionist school. Most people are familiar with Expression as an art movement, and Edvard Munch's painting "The Scream" is a good symbol of the school. "Art is a shout", said one expressionist, and in "Masses and Man" the shout is one of anger, of frustration, of despair at the realization that man is in a position from which there is no escape.

The action of the play folows the struggle of a middle class woman who deserts her husband for the revolutionary cause, only to find that her aim of a new and better world is to be gained by violent revolution. She cannot accept the justification of these means, and committing herself to a stand that rejects both her old class and her new comrades, she must suffer the consequences. On one level, the play examines the means versus end conflict, on another the class differences which propagate injustice and on another, the conflict between commitment and conscience. Each person is an individual and is also a part of society, and the irr-esolvable divergence of these two roles is thematically central to the play.

Expressionism as a school is remarkable in a number of ways. Its plays are non-realistic: in "Masses and Man" there are seven scenes, called "pictures") every alternate one being a dream sequence. These dream sequences are quite fantastic and grotesque, with sinister depictions of capitalist society, the outcasts of society, and the woman's prison cell. The characters range from larger than life bankers through to barely defined shadows.

Outside the dream pictures the action is only slightly less unreal, for although the story moves through a quite conventional chronological sequence, this sequence is added to in the dreams, and a kind of ghostly determinism pervades all. There is an unspoken mood throughout the whole play that suggests the influence of some force or forces far more powerful than any individual or mass.

But although expressionist characters are types, they are not puppets. They are engaged in an active, passionate fight against the forces which oppress them.

The dialogue is stripped to its bare essentials, often right down to slogans and key words. The play is word-oriented in that language gives it meaning and context, but the visual and overall sound effects are equally important.

Lighting, projection, sound-effects and the set itself are all vitally active elements. Expressionism has been condemned as being overtly formalistic, abstract, experimental, unrealistic art given to exploiting the absurd and grotesque. It is true that the form is very important, and we New Zealand audiences especially tend to ignore any significance such plays may have to ourselves. But one cannot deny that the more effective the form, the more likely is the message to be conveyed. Expressionists believed that dynamic form was the most effective, and therefore their plays do have strong theatrical elements. "Masses and Man" is grotesque in parts, but by no means absurd. This grotesqueness is the direct result of the savage satire used by Expressionists, and is not a form for its own sake. However, whatever one's views are on the relative roles of form and content in theatre, "Masses and Man" remains a compelling play.

The Drama Studies production adheres closely to the Play's Expressionist context. A very complex lighting ploy is used, as well as multiple projection of abstract moving shapes directly onto the set during the dream sequences. The sound which has been improvised and is quite unreal, is used throughout the play as an integral element and transcends the usual use of "theme" music The set is worthy of special mention, as it makes use of Unity's unusually-high acting area. The actors themselves are on stage for almost the whole play and create very powerful visual and aural images.

"Masses and Man" is a play of a type not often seen in Wellington and should prove to be very exciting theatre. The production is totally the work of Drama Studies students under the direction of Jim Spalding.