Onstage re-creations of historical events, featuring real life figures, pose a host of challenges for the creators, not the least of which is their need to maintain a delicate balance between accuracy (however that is defined) and interpretation.
The task becomes especially daunting if the topic and characters in question are emotionally charged. Consider "Copenhagen," a new play by Michael Frayn, which bowed on Broadway at the Royale Theatre April 11. The award-winning British import, playing in London's West End to sold-out houses, details a 1941 encounter between Nobel prize-winning German physicist Werner Heisenberg (Michael Cumptsy)-who helmed the atomic bomb program for the Nazis-and his Danish Nobel Prize-winning mentor Niels Bohr (Philip Bosco) and Bohr's wife Margrethe (Blair Brown).
Why Heisenberg secretly journeyed to Copenhagen and what transpired between the two men has intrigued historians and scientists for more than five decades. Was Heisenberg attempting to elicit classified scientific information from Bohrs? Or, was he there to warn him in some way? At that point in time, Germany was winning the war. Indeed, its victory seemed imminent.
Beyond those questions, the ongoing historical-philosophical debate centers on what role, if any, the meeting had in shaping World War II's end in general, and the creation-and ultimate proliferation of-nuclear weapons in particular.
One thing is certain. Despite Heisenberg's undisputed brilliance, he did not make the necessary calculations to create the bomb for Germany. As presented in "Copenhagen," those calculations should have been virtually obvious to someone of his intellectual stature. The fundamental question that haunts scholars to this day is was he suffering from moral compunction-and thus deliberately chose not to take the necessary steps? Or, was he simply inept or perhaps even blindly arrogant at that moment (arrogant in his conviction that atomic fusion could not take place and no other scientific team was going to do it either)?
Awash in ambiguity, the play resolves none of it, suggesting that all these questions are open to interpretation. Indeed, various spins are presented. (Shades of "Rashomon.")
In an effort to look at some of these issues and how they affected the crafting of the play, playwright Michael Frayn and director Michael Blakemore participated in a discussion at The Graduate Center (at 34th Street and Fifth Avenue) of the City University of New York, on March 27.
Entitled "Creating "Copenhangen': Theatrical Perspectives," and moderated by WFMU "Green Room" host Dorian Devins, the lively symposium was the culmination of a series of scholarly seminars on the 1941 meeting. The overflowing audience was largely made up of aging and retired academics, who listened intently and lined up at mikes to ask questions.
The symposium was initiated and produced by the Ensemble Studio Theatre/Alfred P. Sloan Foundation First Light Festival, whose mission is to put a human face on science and challenge-through commissioning plays about scientists-existing stereotypes about science and its practitioners.
In all fairness, whatever criticisms may be leveled at "Copenhagen," promoting unflattering stereotypes of scientists is not one of them. Both Heisenberg and Bohr emerge as three-dimensional human beings, with their own complexities and contradictions. Bohr is the warmer, more accessible of the two, while Heisenberg is edgier, a little more elusive.
Creating theses characters was not easy, said Michael Frayn, best known for his play "Noises Off." "I read everything I could about them in both English and German. I read what they wrote and what others wrote. Still, when you write a play you have to address questions of plausibility. Do the characters come to life?"
He added, "Clearly, you don't know what someone was thinking or precisely what was said." And then there's the distorting role of memory, Frayn continued. Even if someone knew the central players, his recollections are probably skewed.
In a "Copenhagen" postscript Frayn writes: "It's impossible to catch the exact tone of voice of people one never knew, with only the written record to go on, especially when most of what their contemporaries recall them as saying was originally said in other languages. There are also more particular problems with all three of my protagonists.
"Bohr, for a start, was as notorious for his inarticulacy and inaudibility as he was famous for his goodness and lovability....My Bohr is necessarily a little more coherent than this....The problem with Heisenberg is his elusiveness and ambiguity, which is of course what the play is attempting to elucidate."
The most problematic figure is Bohr's wife Margrethe. In "Copen-hagen" she serves as a counterpoint to the two men, cool, unsentimental, and scientifically sophisticated. The fact is, remarked Frayn, little is known about her.
"I suspect she was more gracious and reserved than she appears here," writes Frayn in the postscript. "But she plainly had great firmness of character....She was always cooler about Heisenberg than Bohr was, and she was openly angry about his visit in 1941."
The biggest challenge, said Frayn, was shaping the piece from the massive amount of material and making it accessible. "I was afraid it would be too abstract." These characters are talking physics and while a theoretical background might prove useful, it's not essential to follow the overall story."
Director Michael Blakemore-who helmed "The Life" and, most recently, "Kiss Me, Kate"-observed that the scientific detail made casting difficult. "Some actors thought the play felt like a lecture and were uncomfortable because they didn't have the background. My only scientific qualification is that I failed medical school."
Laughs.
"But I found the work mesmerizing and I don't think an audience needs to understand all the science. And while the play is initially about the creation of the bomb, the play also looks at the way our perceptions of reality changed as a result [of nuclear fission]. The actors we cast in both the London and New York productions were fascinated by that element. And they saw the passion beneath the scientific details that might not have been all that clear to them early on."
Still, the possibilities for misinterpretation are everywhere, Frayn observed. "The play has been incorrectly perceived by some critics as a moral debate over the rights and wrongs of the two scientists. That's not what I intended. I am told I should have placed Heisenberg in the broader context of his other actions in the war. But I feel the play has to focus on one piece of the action. I approach the situation from a philosophical viewpoint. What talked to me was the difficulty in knowing what is going on in someone's head.
"Yes, the play deals with moral issues," he emphasized. "But it seems to me the philosophical issues come first. So before you rush to judgement about someone's behavior you have to know his motivation."
Frayn added that the feelings against Heisenberg are so intense, it's difficult to understand the position in which he found himself. "People who have not lived in totalitarian societies should be a little cautious in judging those who have. I don't think you can demand heroism. That would diminish heroism."
Scattered applause.
Still, during the and A, one elderly man in the audience objected. He did not quite accuse Frayn of being an apologist for Heisenberg-and, by extension, Nazism. But he more than hinted at it by suggesting that the play "presented both sides in the war as two equals," and therefore the conflict between the two men-although "beautifully done," he stressed-was set in a false context.
A moment of hesitation followed by a round of applause.
"The Nazi regime as an evil is a given!" Frayn responded.
Most of the and A comments were laudatory, praising the play, the casting, and the staging; although one woman puzzled over the latter, wondering why part of the audience was seated on bleachers forming a semi-arc onstage. Yes, onstage, literally. Approximately three dozen viewers stare down at the actors while facing the rest of the audience.
Blakemore retorted that "Copenhagen" is a highly theatrical event. "It is not film or TV. We are not pretending to be any place other than a theatre-and in a theatre, theatregoers are keenly aware of each other. Of course, that becomes a problem if some audience member seated onstage falls asleep."
Chortles.
More important, he continued, the unusual seating arrangement works as a kind of metaphor for the whole play by highlighting the subjective "nature of observation": theatergoers experiencing the onstage events from different angles, literally and figuratively. Blakemore talked about the metaphorical elements throughout, suggesting that the interaction of the characters mirrored in some way the theories of physics that the Bohr and Heisenberg were discussing.
The staging is simple and stark. The set consists of three chairs that are moved about. "The staging lets the audience know that it has to listen. And [the staging] came out of the way the play was written. There were no stage directions," Blakemore noted, adding that the absence of stage directions enhanced the notion of a non-linear play, moving back and forth in time, seamlessly.
Interestingly, the absence of stage directions-as well as the aforementioned scientific details in the work-put many actors off, Blakemore reiterated. "Fortunately, we didn't get stars!"
Laughs.
For the actors on both sides of the Atlantic it was a labor of love, since nobody anticipated a broad-based audience for it. He also noted that contrary to what one might expect the two productions were not all that different. "The English actors are more rooted in language. The Americans are more emotionally volatile, but both sets of performances are dazzling, although there's a slightly different feel and response on the audience's part. Many in London did experience the blitz."
Dorian Devins, the moderator, commented that "Copenhagen" was far removed from "Kiss Me, Kate," Blakemore's previous production. The director agreed, offering an unexpected thought. "It's much harder to find the comedy in comedy than it is in drama. "Copenhagen' was fun from the beginning. "Kiss Me Kate' eventually became fun!"
Beat. Big laugh!