Ladies and gentlemen, esteemed directors. I am here to present to you my vision of Woyzeck written

by Georg Büchner. After reading the play and watching Alban Berg’s interpretation, I was intrigued

by how the play and the opera production has presented different scene sequences and after I did

some background research I’ve come to discover that the play, Woyzeck does not have a solid

structure and that the scenes can be rearranged. And so, the way the stage is set up and the settings

will be different for every director. I hope that by the end, you too will understand my vision.

Now even though I have my own ideas, there are some things that I want to keep the same or at

least, I believe it was the intention of Büchner. For instance, the setting of the performance. The

setting was not clearly established in the script but just by reading the script, you would get a sense

of the period. There are miserable soldiers, parade leaders with humungous egos, annoying

captains, evil doctors and talking mushrooms.

From that, I can imagine the play to be set during war time back in the late eighteenth to nineteenth

century; the early years of World War I because you don’t sense the modernness in the play.

For setting, I chose England because I believe status was important especially in that country since

there are so many positions in their hierarchy. The setting is important because it would influence

everything from stage design to the costumes and to the acting.

The scene I have specifically chosen to focus is scene seven with Marie, Woyzeck’s wife and the

Drum-Major. To sum up this scene, the Drum-Major shows off to Marie, while she teases him. The

Drum-Major then forces himself on Marie. Initially, Marie struggles, however eventually she

succumbs to him.

I chose this scene because this scene is a short yet intimate scene where the audience are introduced

to the real Marie, Woyzeck’s wife. In the script, Marie was characterized as a poor woman yet

someone who has the dignity and pride of any lady. However in this scene, it shows that with a

man, it was all the same to her when she finally gave in to the Drum-Major saying, “What’s it

matter anyway? It’s all one.” It also shows that persistent and audacious side of the Drum Major

when he did not back down when Marie begins to struggle using bold movement and language.

I would like to first talk about the staging. I’ve set the stage according to the script, in Marie’s

room. The reason I called this Marie’s room is because I think that from the strain in the

relationship between Marie and her husband, she would be sleeping alone moreover because I think

that Woyzeck rarely sleeps at home, always being in the barracks and all.

I have decided to use the proscenium arch stage because I want the audience to focus on the two

characters on the stage. That’s why there will be a round thrust stage in the front where Marie and

the Drum Major will stand.

I want to have a simple stage because the scene will focus on the atmosphere and to create

atmosphere, I will use lighting and the actor and actress. This is the model I created on Google

sketch up.

The only furniture I am using in this setting is a bed and the window. The reason I chose to place a

window in the scene is because the window acts as a symbol. If someone looks through a window,

it would seem like there is a separation between the viewer and the outside world. The window has

glass so the person is left as a spectator, not as someone who has any kind of involvement with the

world. This is similar to Marie. She gets called a whore and she is poor. She could not fight back

because she is in no position to. However, she understands what they mean when they call her a

whore but she still has the dignity to compare herself with any woman.

I placed a bed on the stage to make her bedroom more obvious for both the setting and the story.

Now I move on to the lighting. I am not going to use any complicated lights. I want to use a dim

soft and warm yellowy orangey flood light to create a fire-like colour. Like light from a candle. This

is to give a warm homey feeling that is Marie’s bedroom to make the set real and relatable.

I don’t need a spotlight when both characters will be interacting on the thrust stage so they are

already in the centre of attention.

The audience will be placed around the thrust stage so that in a sense, Marie and the Drum Major

will be surrounded by the audience. There will be less audience because of less space.

I’m going to be quick on the acting. As for the actors creating atmosphere, the intensity of their

closeness and the emotion conveyed in each sentence should help guide the audience to the motives

of the two characters. For instance, to show Marie being seductive, she could be speaking slowly in

a low husky voice as she gets closer to the Drum Major.

Now we move to costumes. The time of my scene would be during the late 18th to the 19th century.

I had a basic idea of the costume design and began to do research images, after that, I’ve drawn

three designs for both Marie and the Drum Major to experiment with the different components.

Let’s start with Marie. Here are two different styles of a 18th century dress: the low class and the

high class. You can clearly see the difference between the two dress because the dress on the right

obviously is more detailed and looks more expensive, whilst the dress on the left is fairly simply but

is still beautiful.

Here is my chosen design. Marie’s dress shows grey to show her depression towards her life and her

husband. She has red lips to show that she is still a beautiful woman despite what Margaret says

about her. Plus, it also adds to her charm. The brown on her dress shows her natural strength and

that she is not a weak spirited woman.

Now onto the Drum Major. I assumed that this picture is of a French Drum Major because the

colours used here are all the colours of the French flag. Weird logic I know. I tried looking at a

different aspect. This is a photo taken by me. These people here are high ranking officers of an

Asian country. Their uniform was different but they are more formal suits. I did get some ideas

form the little details from their suits though.

The uniforms for soldiers in Europe were all similar to each other so I had many components to

play with. For example you can see that each of the designs here are relatively different but still

uses similar colours.

And here is my final design. The colours I used on the Drum Major’s uniform is meant to represent

his authority and power over Marie in the scene. He has bold colours like black to show authority

and power, stability and strength. Black also makes him look thinner. He has gold to show that he

has gain medals of honor and he has pride. While the blue means that he is loyal. It does not

necessarily mean the the Drum Major himself is loyal, but the colour of his clothes represent his

position.

Well that’s all I have to say. Thank you for listening!