Tribeca Dispatch: Friday, May 2 (Theater of War)

After four hours at Dow Jones, I spent - yes! - more time in movie theaters. I paid for none of it, though. Earlier in the day, I’d told several people that while most of the films I’d seen this year were pretty good, none left me energized and enthralled. I found that magic moment at last, in a flick I didn’t even know about at the beginning of the festival.

First movie seen: Theater of War
What it is (description from TFF Web site): Art and politics converge in this provocative look at the life and ideas of Bertolt Brecht, interwoven with The Public Theater's staging of his Mother Courage. Meryl Streep, Tony Kushner, Kevin Kline, and George C. Wolfe take audiences on a behind-the-scenes look at their creative process.
Viewing partners: none
General festival notes: 1) This year, volunteers have the chance to attend more free screenings than ever before; in fact, Friday and Saturday were all-day film fests at the Village East. (I’m skipping Saturday, as I’m already seeing two movies.) We don’t find out what the movie is until we arrive at the theater. Much to my delight, the two selections I caught were ones I hadn’t been able to get into during the previous 10 days. 2) Working Press and Industry screenings has the added perk of giving me access to press notes. During the week, this helped me discover movies I’d ignored in the online guide. That’s how I found Fighter.

Theater Review: Acting class with Meryl Streep! Oh, and the politics of theater, war and Bertolt Brecht. Thus summarizes John Walter’s documentary Theater of War, which really explores the 2006 Central Park production of Mother Courage and Her Children.

The Iraq War inspired playwright Tony Kushner to adapt Brecht’s 1939 work for Streep. The actress said she’d been reluctant to show her “process” because that’s “clunky,” but thank goodness she did: Otherwise, the film feels like a dense collegiate English lecture with strident anti-war sentiment. Theater comes to life with Streep, naturally, but also in examining Brecht. The movie intersperses scenes from a Berlin production starring his wife, and daughter Barbara traces Brecht’s time in exile and testimony before the House un-American Activities Committee.

Ultimately, it’s Streep, “the voice of dead people … interpreter of lost songs,” who engages us in Theater. The Oscar for Best Performance in a Documentary goes to …