Erich Engel, who was co-directing with Brecht, quit during rehearsals. When the production opened, both received billing. Comments in the press suggest that it may have been generally known that Engel had quit, although he was still billed. A New York Times report on the production by C. Hooper Trask, published in the issue dated October 27, 1929, refers to "the direction of Bert Brecht," with no mention of Engel. So it may be that Engel's name was removed during the run.
Kurt Weill: A Life in Pictures and Documents, by David Farneth (with Elmar Juchem and Dave Stein) states that the production closed after three performances, and Foster Hirsch's Kurt Will On Stage: From Berlin to Broadway states, similarly, that the prodution closed two days after the opening.
Different information is given in Stephen Hinton's Weill's Musical Theatre: Stages of Reform, where it is stated that "the production closed on 1 October, 1929, just four weeks after its premiere on 2 September. Advertisements published in the Berliner Tageblatt confirm that the new play was performed at least six times a week for the entire month, contradicting assertions in the secondary literature that the production folded after just a matter of days."
We have chosen to list the closing date given by Hinton, but there is some evidence that the production may have run even longer than stated by Hinton. This evidence comes from a report on the production by C. Hooper Trask that was published in the New York Times on October 27, 1929, but dated October 3. Trask found much to praise in the production. He concluded with the following: "There is no doubt that 'Happy End' is a failure here and it will be taken off in a short time, but I personally feel that it would make an interesting production on Broadway." Perhaps Trask did not know that it had closed a couple of days before he sent in his report or perhaps it ran just a bit longer than even Hinton has found.
Given that the date given by Hinton for the closing was a Tuesday, perhaps it simply ran through Saturday or Sunday of that week. Or perhaps it was not unusual for shows in Berlin to close in midweek.
