Even without Anna Jordan’s abrasive contemporary translation, Bertolt Brecht’s 1939 tale of a wartime profiteer would seem depressingly relevant. This staging by Elle While, the first for one of the German writer’s plays at the Globe, sits so securely in the wooden auditorium and communes so directly with the audience you feel the place could have been built for him.
It wasn’t of course – the clue is in its full name. But full marks (or should that be full Marx?) to artistic director Michelle Terry for programming this piece of big, bold, populist political theatre. And for giving an enthralling performance as Courage, the hard-bitten scavenger who learns the hard way that commercial neutrality is no guarantee of safety on a battlefield.
