Lindsey German reviews Bertolt Brecht’s 1941 play and its relevance to current political developments

It’s the Depression in 1930s Chicago. Workers are struggling, the cost of living is rising and so is discontent. Enter the washed-up gangster Arturo Ui and his men. He decides to take over the vegetable business, offering the Cauliflower Trust protection. What follows is a predictable tale of eliminating the opposition, operating shady deals and terrorising the neighbourhood. Brecht famously used gangster characters to depict the horrors and brutality of capitalism. Here however he is creating what he called a ‘parable play’ about the rise of Adolf Hitler.

It is a brilliant concept and one that shows the development of Hitler’s power is not accidental but has behind it big business and mainstream politicians as well as fascist thugs. The play shows a number of scenes which mirror Hitler’s rise: the warehouse fire is the Reichstag fire; the assassination of his close lieutenant Roma is the Night of the Long Knives; the takeover of the neighbouring town of Cicero is the Anschluss of Austria. Ui’s gang are Roma, based on Roehm, head of the SA, Givola (Goebbels) and Giri (Goering). President Hindenberg is Dogsborough, bought off by the Nazis and responsible for appointing Hitler as Chancellor in January 1933.

Ui is played by Mark Gatiss in an outstanding performance. His physical appearance – not just his face and protruding teeth, but his shambling gait, his old raincoat and his wheedling voice – is powerful. So too are the scenes where he transitions from down on his luck gangster to great dictator. The most memorable is where an old Shakespearean actor trains him in how to walk and speak. His adoption of the goosestep is followed by his oration of the whole of Mark Antony’s speech from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as he perfects his oratorical style. As events move on he becomes the swastika wearing dictator fully formed.

In Brechtian style, we have screens showing the connections between his actions and the history of the Nazis. The play opens with an ‘actor’ explaining what will happen and concludes with a very powerful epilogue. The ensemble cast are outstanding, perhaps the two most obviously Janie Dee, who takes on a number of roles, including Betty Dollfeet, widow of the murdered Austrian Chancellor, and Mawaan Rizwan, who is both the ‘actor’ MC and Giri, played with a sinister energy.

The whole circus-like atmosphere, heightened by excellent music from Placebo, makes this an exceptional theatrical experience, and very suited to the intimate Swan Theatre with its galleries. It is one of those plays which is hard to forget and this production certainly will stay in your mind.

Not least for current parallels. Donald Trump is an obvious one, and Gatiss manages the slightly creepy wheedling suddenly transformed into psychopathic anger. In a week when the far right has done much too well in elections here, it highlights the dangers of the return of fascism. Its famous epilogue is presented very movingly by Gatiss in his own voice, rather than the American gangster accent of Ui.

‘Do not rejoice in his defeat, you men. For though the world has stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again.’

Brecht wrote this play from exile in 1941 and it was only performed long after Hitler was dead in his bunker. This revival could not be more timely. It is great entertainment but very thought provoking and should be a spur to action. As are all the best plays. At the Swan Theatre, Stratford Upon Avon, until 30 May.