Comparison Between the Play and Musical
Scene Breakdown Comparison | |
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Timeline of Scenes | |
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Character Breakdown Comparison
Musical Play Wendla Bergman………...………………………………...…….Wendla Bergmann Martha Bessell…………….……………………………..……………Martha Bessel Thea……………………….………………………………………………………Thea Anna…………………….……………………………………….…………………N/A Ilse…………………….……………………………………………………………..Ilse Melchior Gabor………………...……….………………...…………..Melchior Gabor Moritz Stiefel……………………......…………………..……………..Moritz Stiefel Hanschen/Rupert……………....…........………….………………Hanschen; Rupert Ernst/Reinhold……………………….........……………..………….Ernst; Reinhold Georg/Dieter……………………....………………………………..……Georg; Dieter Otto/Ulbrecht……………….....…………………….………………..…….Otto; N/A N/A………………..………………………………………………………………Robert N/A………………..…………………………………………….……….Lämmermeier N/A………………..……………………………………………………………..Helmut N/A………………..………………………………………………………...……Gaston Frau Bergman………...……………………………………………….Frau Bergmann Frau Gabor……………...…………………………………………………..Frau Gabor Frau Bessell……………..…………………………………………………………..N/A Fraulein Knuppeldick……......……………………………….……..Other Professors Fraulein Grossebustenhalter………......……………………………..……………N/A Herr Gabor………………………………...…………………………..……Herr Gabor Herr Stiefel…………...………...…………………………………………..Herr Stiefel Herr Rilow…………………....……………………………………………..…..……N/A Herr Neumann…………....……..…………………………………………………..N/A Herr Sonnenstich………....……………………………………..………………….N/A Headmaster Knochenbruch…………….....…………………………..Dr. Procrustes Father Kaulbach………………………...…………….………….Reverend Baldbelly Doctor von Brausepulver…………….........…………………….…..Dr. Lemonade Schmidt………………………………….……………………………………..Schmidt N/A………………………………………….…………………….………….Ina Muller |
Notes from Steven Sater
“As others have noted, the two biggest shifts we made to the tale occur at the ends of Act One and Act Two – in the hayloft and then in the graveyard. In Wedekind’s script, Melchior ‘date-rapes’ Wendla. We wanted to see him make love to her. More: we wanted to show how this young man (who jests at his friend’s puberty wounds) first uncovers ineluctable sexual feelings; how he begins his own sexual identity; how he helps Wendla awaken to hers. The truth is, we had already, irrevocably, set Melchior on this path when we gave him the song: ‘Touch Me.’ There, he articulates his sense of ‘the female’ yearning for pleasure, singing as if in some hypothetical woman’s voice, ‘Touch me, just like that. Now, there, that’s it – God, that’s heaven…’ Sheltered in a hayloft in a rainstorm with an actual young woman – Wendla – and confronted with the possibility of actually giving her that pleasure, Melchoir cannot restrain himself. As for the graveyard…suffice it to say, after seven years’ labor, we finally dispensed with the notorious Masked Man. This Symbolist figure appears – literally out of nowhere – in the last scene of Wedekind’s text. He confronts the despairing Melchior and assures him that with a warm meal in his belly, he will no longer chafe to join his friend Moritz in the grave. […] We finally realized that within our piece the music already performs the role of the Masked Man, for it gives our adolescent characters a voice to celebrate, to decry, to embrace the darker longings within them as part of them, rather than as something to run from or repress. As for Moritz arising from his grave to tell Melchior how good the dead have it, hovering high above joy and despair…it just seemed wrong to us – a cop-out, for dramaturgic effect, on a character we cared about and had worked hard to illuminate” (Sater xi). Melchior “Now we had the end of our tale: a boy left thoroughly distraught, his rebellious spirit broken by The System, somehow finds sustenance at the source of his sufferings. He has learned to learn from his heart. If the lesson to be learned was of the heart, then it made sense that we would introduce Melchior as a guy with a naïve rebellious pride in the power of his own mind. And so (working backward from the lesson learned by show’s end), we wrote his opening number, ‘All That’s Known.’ The realization of how our story should begin led us to construct an entirely new opening scene for our young rebel – the Latin Class – which does not exist in the original. This scene allowed us to see the boys in school. It allowed us to introduce a world of repression, where students are struck for giving the wrong answers. It let us see Moritz floundering. Most important, it showed us Melchior standing up for his friend and defending him” (Sater xii). Wendla “In contrast, we were clear from the beginning about how to launch Wendla’s story, and ‘Mama Who Bore Me’ was one of the first songs Duncan and I wrote. I always felt our show should begin with this determined young woman asking her mother how babies are born, only be to rebuffed, coddled with bourgeois evasion. In the original, this classic scene falls in Act Two. Wendla has already met Melchior, has indeed already been beaten by him. Moving the scene to the top of the show allowed us to make a political point right from the start: the seeds of the entire ‘children’s tragedy’ are sown by this one willful act of silence – a parent failing to talk honestly to her child about sex” (Sater xii). As Wedekind scripted it, the hayloft scene if brief – startlingly brief. With next to no acknowledgment of the horrific beating Melchior has inflicted on her, Wendla kneels beside him in the hay, and he begins kissing her. A moment later, he forces himself on her. We worked hard to flesh out a fuller scene between them, to let our would-be lovers struggle to make sense of what they have so brutally done – to offer one another forgiveness, before they fall into each other’s arms. From the top of Act Two, we wanted to see Wendla confusedly awakening to her own womanhood, owning her love-making, claiming her part of the pleasure. Where Wedekind gives her an Ophelia-like morning after, our young heroine celebrates in song the sweet unknown world she’s just discovered. The final arc of her journey, however, came late in the process. […] Our Wendla chooses to remember the love she has felt, to ignore the ghostly whispers of society, and embrace the new life already whispering within her” (Sater xiv). Sources: Sater, Steven, and Duncan Sheik. Spring Awakening: A New Musical. New York: Theatre Communications Group, 2007. Print. Wedekind, Frank. Spring Awakening. Trans. Edward Bond. London: Methuen Drama, 2009. Print. |