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Recordings listed here were done in the studio specifically to release as recordings. They do not represent cast recordings of a particular production.
See Trivis & History note on this page.
In the program for the original production, the source was given as a "Magazingesichte" (magazine story) by Dorothy Lane. This was the first credit under the title. Below that Elisabeth Hauptmann was credited with the "Deutsche Bearbeitung" (German adaptation). But no such magazine story ever existed.
The idea for the show seems to have originated with Brecht, who sent a letter to Hauptmann (his secretary and sometime collaborator) proposing that she write the script for the show. He sent her a very vague outline with few plot details beyond the idea of a struggle between a group of gangsters and the Salvation Army in which the Army triumphs at the end. He may have made more specific suggestions later, or perhaps Hauptmann invented the plot largely on her own.
A report that appeared in the New York Times on October 27, 1929, gave the title of the nonexistent story as "Under the Mistletoe." Where the author, C. Hooper Trask, got that title is unknown. Trask seems to have been under the wrong impression that Hauptmann was the wife of Gerhart Hauptmann. Trask also wrote, "The chances, however, are that Bert Brecht is responsbile for the whole potpourri." But today it is generally believed that Hauptmann did write most or all of the dialogue. Brecht is always credited solely with the lyrics, but in his book Weill's Musical Stages: Theater of Reform, Stephen Hinton writes that Brecht "probably did not write all of them." Hinton does not suggest which may not have been by Brecht or who may have authored those not by Brecht.
The made-up name Dorothy Lane is often treated as a pseudonym for Elisabeth Hauptmann, but this is perhaps questionable since there was no magazine story and the idea and the outline originated with Brecht.
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