Jürs-Munby, Karen (2006) 'Ich will seicht sein' : Elfriede Jelinek's Schauspielmodel (l) als Ideologiekritik und Medienst'rung. In: Das Analoge sträubt sich gegen das Digitale: : Materialitäten des deutschsprachigen Theaters in einer Welt des Virtuellen. Theater der Zeit Recherchen, pp. 86-100. ISBN 9783934344815
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
It has by now been well established that most of Elfriede Jelinek's texts for the theatre can hardly be described as 'drama' anymore, since they lack a dramatic plot or dialogue and instead offer 'text surfaces' consisting of dense montages of quotes. Yet scholars have paid comparatively less attention to the fact that her 'postdramatic' theatre aesthetics also demands an entirely new form of acting that is intimately bound up with her methodical attack on prevailing ideologies and power structures. After briefly examining the nexus of 'natural acting', subjectivity and ideology (with reference to Althusser), which Jelinek denunciates in plays like Burgtheater and Macht Nichts!, this essay explores the alternative model of acting she envisions in theoretical texts like 'I want to be shallow' (1983) and 'Sense doesn't matter. Body purposeless' (1997)). With reference to Thirza Brunken's production of Stecken, Stab und Stangl (1996) and Jelinek's essay 'In Mediengewittern' (2003), I argue that Jelinek's new theatre is a response to a changing media landscape. Her postdramatic theatre aesthetic and form of acting is not only directed against the ideological power of older forms of theatre and acting but crucially aims to act as a kind of critical 'interference' for the ongoing hegemonic power wielded by 'the media' (by press, radio and especially television).