The Threepenny Opera

The set is the bare bones of London’s criminal districts and is the theatrical equivalent of a sketch on stage. The design consists of three key box-like structures with extendible arms- their texture resembling grimy cast iron. The structures are pushed and lightly dressed in front view of the audience between scenes to create the play’s five settings.

• They become the clothing racks and changerooms of Peachum’s Emporium, fitted with curtains that nod to the Brechtian half-curtain.
• The horizontal bar structure is climbed to access Polly’s bedroom ‘upstairs.’
• When diagonal, the hollow structures capture the emptiness of the stables.
• The structure with a solid wall is flipped on its side, acting as seating in the stables and the death cell of the Old Bailey, and as a table in the Whorehouse in Turnbridge.
• The same wire used for Peachum’s is used to drape the carpet in the stables that hides the bed, and works in tandem with a short curtain to create the window into the Whorehouse.
• The structures become the cells of the Old Bailey, the horizontal bars resembling the prison behind which Macheath resides, and later climbs as he ascends to the hanging noose.

Architecturally, these three structures act as framing devices for the figures whilst being thin to not interfere with sight lines. Brechtian in their industrial and representational nature, the stage still feels bare - rejecting naturalism.