This exercise is based on the 1974 film of the play by Joseph Losey . It’s a bit different from a stage production but still has “Brechtian” elements. You don’t have to watch the entire film, but it’s a pretty fair version of the staged play.
We’ve discussed a couple of “performance moments” in Galileo where the visual, scenic, or physical action creates meanings that are at least as important as what we learn from the dialogue and characters. To better understand how important these are, I recommend first reading the brief essay “Production Elements of Design,”which details the different elements of theatrical production and how they come together to form a unified stage composition. Second, read through Scene 11
Then, watch the scene assigned, and respond with a brief paragraph explaining how the performance elements reflect or enhance the main themes of the play. Once you’ve posted a response, you’ll be able to see those of other students: browse these and find one to “Like.”
Here are the assigned scenes:
1. Watch the Ball scene in Scene Six (Part One, from 44″-51:30″). Comment on the nature of the exchange between Galileo, Bellarmin, and Barberini How do the costuming and movement create tension between the characters? Note especially the ending, when as they rejoin the party Bellarmin and Barberini prepare to put on their masks and remark that “poor Galileo hasn’t got one.”
2. Watch Scene Nine (April Fool’s Day) in Part Two at 17:10″. This presents a sudden shift to a performance style we haven’t seen yet and features another social class showing us how they interpret Galileo’s discoveries and theories. Why do you think Brecht inserts it here – why the shift in perspective? Then talk about how the movement/choreography mimics the effects of Galileo’s ideas, and comment on whether the lower classes seem as concerned as the nobility that “order” will be lost and that people may “do what pleases them.”
3. Watch Scene Eleven (The Pope) in Part Two at 31:55″. How does the staging of his Papal dressing (always a very formal event in any case) convey something essential about Barberini’s (now Pope Urban VIII) dilemma in agreeing to have Galileo examined by the Inquisition? Remember, Barberini is an intellectual, a humanist, and an early supporter of Galileo. How does the performance moment use costume and movement to echo the theme of the Individual vs. the State that develops across the play?
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