Staged: Show Trials, Political Theater, and the Aesthetics of Judgment by Minou Arjomand (review)

In this timely book, Minou Arjomand braids together philosophical writings, theatrical events, and legal proceedings from the post-Holocaust historical moment to illuminate the lessons of the past and apply them to the present. Calling back to the premiere of Aeschylus’s The Oresteia at the Great Dionysia Festival in 458 BCE, Arjomand sets up the foundational theory of this book: theatre is a space that has the ability to manifest multiple publics, and “trial plays have a particular capacity to reflect on how publics are constituted through the act of judging” (2). It is through judgment, both in the postwar trials and postwar trial plays, that new postwar societies were able to constitute themselves.

The book examines pre– and post–World War II German theatre spanning a time period from about 1918 to 1968 with a focus on postwar theatre. This analysis of postwar theatre and philosophy is delivered in five chapters. Chapters 1 through 3 are each devoted to historical figures, Hannah Arendt, Bertolt Brecht, and Erwin Piscator, respectively. The fourth chapter is an examination of the documentary theatre play Trial in Nuremberg and the conclusion uses Anna Deavere Smith’s 2016 play Notes from the Field: Doing Time in Education to reflect on how new forms of documentary theatre can “stage the relationship between justice and law” (173).

The chapter on Arendt argues that much of the scholarship about Arendt and her work Eichmann in Jerusalem lacks historical contextualization. Therefore, her use of theatre as a philosophical tool can be misunderstood as a rejection of all theatricality when what Arendt is really doing in her writing is “criticizing one mode of dramaturgy while elevating another” (27). Arjomand rectifies this oversight by detailing how theatre is the foundation of Arendt’s conceptions of politics and the public realm. This chapter highlights how Arendt specifically rejected the “Aristotelian dramaturgy of fate, pity, and catharsis” but embraced an epic dramaturgy à la Brecht that is oriented “toward judgement and action” (26). This rejection by Arendt and her contemporaries of the postwar idea that the Holocaust was inevitable underpins the remaining chapters of this book.

In the second chapter on Brecht, Arjomand treads through familiar territory to any theatre or performance scholar. She posits that the model of courtroom testimony is the base of Brecht’s epic theatre, stating, “In many of his plays Brecht includes trial scenes that emphasize the injustice of courtroom proceedings. Indeed, what is so often put on trial on Brecht’s stage is, first and foremost, the courtroom itself ” (59). This chapter illuminates the historical context behind Brecht’s Moscow Trials essays on formalism in the late 1930s and his appearance before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947 as a way to position Brecht as an artist who rejected the rigidity of the printed word in favor of the flexibility of theatrical interpretation. The bulk of the chapter is a deep dive into the 1954 premiere of The Caucasian Chalk Circle. Here, Arjomand details the rehearsal process, staging, and the program book to show how Brecht made The Caucasian Chalk Circle work to his advantage both politically and aesthetically. Politically, it was a plea to the German Democratic Republic to let artists have artistic freedom so that they can support the GDR’s political party (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands or SED). Aesthetically, it was a call to artists to not be held hostage by text. The final section in this chapter is a defense of the criticism surrounding Brecht’s relationship to the East German regime. Arjomand argues that rather than fall silent, as Arendt accuses Brecht of doing, Brecht spoke through his theatrical work: “If the 1953 uprising registered dissatisfaction with the party-controlled judiciary, Brecht positioned theatre as an institution that could provide another outlet for thinking and judging that would quell dissatisfaction with the regime” (92).

In the third chapter, Brecht takes a back...