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A Few Words About The Black Rider
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The Black Rider tale probably originates with a work of German romantic
literature known as "Gespensterbuch," published in 1811. It is, however, a
universal story - one of a vast body of sagas of men who make questionable
arrangements with Satan. Most famously told in Carl Maria Von Weber's
opera, Der Freischutz - which featured an altered (happy) ending - The
Black Riders latest telling is a dark, symbolic and comedic affair.
The original story concerns a clerk, Wilhelm, who is in love with Katchen,
daughter of the old forester, Kuno. Kuno wishes his daughter to marry a
hunter. Katchen insists that a marksmanship contest be held to determine
the finest hunter, hoping that Wilhelm might thus have a chance to win.
Wilhelm, however cannot hit the broad side of a barn - until he is
approached by a "dark horseman" called Pegleg. Pegleg arranges to give
Wilhelm some "magic bullets," mysteriously guaranteed to hit anything
Wilhelm aims at -except for one bullet, which Pegleg earmarks for his own
purposes. Wilhelm wins the initial contest, and his bride's hand, but
another shooting match is scheduled for their wedding day. Wilhelm asks
Pegleg, who bears a suspicious resemblance to a leading citizen of the
netherworld, for that last, unused bullet. Firing at a wooden dove, Wilhelm
instead thanks to the cursed bullet - slays his bride.
In Freischutz, divine intervention prevents Wilhelm from killing his bride,
and he gets off the hook with a stern warning about dealing with the devil.
In the Robert Wilson-directed rendition of the story, Wilhelm ends up
raving mad, another strait-jacketed lunatic in Hell's traveling carnival.
The final scene is of Pegleg, sleek in a tuxedo singing a mock-sentimental
song written by Waits, "The Last Rose of Summer" which beings, "I love the
way/The tattered cloud/Go wind across the sky..."
Wilson's direction and, more obviously, Burroughs' libretto imbued The
Black Rider with modern implications and allusions. At one point, the old
forester, Kuno declares: "Some way he got into the magic bullets, and that
leads straight to the devil's work, just like marijuana leads to heroin."
Later, as Waits explained, "one of the actors comes out on stage, stands
alone in a spotlight, talks about an argument between Hemingway and his
agent - about selling out in Hollywood. Burroughs found some of the
branches of the story, and let them grow into more metaphorical things in
all of our lives every day that, in fact, are deals with the devil that
we've made. What is cunning about those deals is that we're not aware we've
made them. And when they come to fruitation, we are shocked and amazed."
Originally staged at a cost of $1.75 million in Hamburg, The Black Rider
was, by all accounts, a remarkable spectacle. John Rockwell referred to it
in the New York Times as a kind of cross of Cabaret, The Threepenny Opera,
and The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Douglas Sutton wrote in the
International Herald Tribune: "Wilson makes objects and actors appear,
disappear, and reappear in pursing the story with tight choreographic
precision." Jackie Wullschlager enthused in the Financial Times of London:
"For three hours of graceful, cold artifice, they (the actors) look, act,
and sound like figures from silent movies...Wilson turns children's
drawings into three-dimensional monstrosities. Crooked chairs, two meters
high, dangle at odd angles...pine trees are scissor cut-outs which collapse
and grow again like cartoons...Waits, sarcastic ballads, full of folk and
blues and rock, call back the scarred idealism and mock simplicity of Kurt
Weill, while Burroughs' monosyllabic banality has here found the setting
which makes it seem perfect."
Aside from Hamburg, The Black Rider was performed in Vienna, Paris,
Barcelona, Genoa, Amsterdam and Berlin. The original production and cast
will make their U.S. debut Nov. 20 at The Brooklyn Academy of Music in
Brooklyn, New York, for a run of ten performances.