Mr Puntila & His Man Matti
Mr Puntila and his Man Matti (German: Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti) is an epic comedy by the German modernist playwright Bertolt Brecht. It was written in 1940 and first performed in 1948.
The story describes the aristocratic land-owner Puntila’s relationship to his servant, Matti, as well as his daughter, Eva, who he wants to marry off to an Attaché. Eva herself loves Matti and so Puntila has to decide whether to marry his daughter to his driver or to an Attaché, while he also deals with a drinking problem.
In his essay “Notes on the Folk Play” (written in 1940), Brecht warns that “naturalistic acting is not enough in this case” and recommends an approach to staging that draws on the Commedia dell’Arte.[1] The central relationship between Mr Puntila and Matti—in which Puntila is warm, friendly and loving when drunk, but cold, cynical and penny-pinching when sober—echoes the relationship between the Tramp and the Millionaire in Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights (1931). The duality of Mr. Puntila is an example of Brecht’s use of the literary device, the split character
Cast & Crew
Cast
| Unknown | Julia Hills |
|---|---|
| Unknown | Alwyne Taylor |
| Unknown | Gary Yershon |
| Unknown | Lola Young |
| Eva | Belinda Lang |
| Matti | Reg Stewart |
| Mr Puntilla | Tom Wilkinson |
| The Attache | David Boyce |
Crew | |
| Director | Jules Wright |
| Incidental Music | Elaine Streeter |
- Added by David Boyce, last modified by Michael Hope.
- Add an observation
- Edit this production
- I saw or am going to see this production
- This is a duplicate of another production
Photographs
If you have a photograph or picture that illustrates this production, please sign in to upload it, or add it to Flickr and tag it with .
Observations
If you have an interesting observation or anecdote about this production that you think others may be interested in, please sign in in order to record it here.
