A German Jew, Weill fled the Nazis in 1933, continued writing for the American musical theatre, and died in the U.S. at age 50 in 1950, proving once again that only the good die young.

If the 1972 movie Cabaret depicted the Weimar era and ambiance that forged Weill’s compositions, the 2004 Kevin Spacey film Beyond the Sea includes Bobby Darin’s famed rendition of the most famous Weill/Brecht song,” Mack the Knife” (which Louie Armstrong also recorded). The murderer MacHeath, but of course, symbolized the predatory nature of capitalism. Although Weill’s most celebrated composition is not performed in Neiges D’Antan – which happily returns Weill to L.A. audiences -- there is a knowing nod to MacHeath in The “Ballad of the Easy Life,” another song from The Three Penny Opera. As mezzo-soprano Elizabeth Ackerman sings:

“A question please: is this

what you call living?

Then take a little tip from Mack the Knife…

The Bulging Pocket Makes the Easy Live.”

Throughout this cabaret-style show, pianist Yazmine C. Fleming expertly accompanies Ackerman, as she sings Weill compositions in flawless French, German and English. (There are no supertitles at the Armory Center for the Arts’ theatrical space; ticket buyers are given written translations of the songs, although it’s too dark to follow the bouncing ball during the performance.)

Fleming and Ackerman bring Weill’s numbers to life with great verve. The songs such as “Je Ne T’aime Pas” (“I Don’t Love You”) are alternately wistful, sorrowful, full of yearning and humorous. Ackerman is tall and slim, with close-cropped gray hair; chicly clad in black slacks and, at times, a sort of smoking jacket, the oratorio soloist cuts a swanky figure onstage. Also an actress, Ackerman often acts out the songs, sometimes miming the actions suggested by the music in mini-skits.

Fleming, too, is extremely expressive, and her visage often seems mournful as she coaxes the ivories to give voice to existential angst. Voluptuous, with long raven black flowing hair, Fleming strips down in one number to her lingerie and strikes an erotic pose. She is reminiscent of those blue angels, Lotte Lenya and Marlene Dietrich, during those all too brief days of the Weimar Republic, before war weary, depression-ravaged Aryans escaped from the chaos of freedom into the gulf of totalitarian mass madness.

There are a total of 12 songs performed on the sparse set, of which Fleming sings one, revealing that she, too, has a lovely voice.  A couple of the songs are accompanied by taped music (or an orchestra of elfin musicians). This sophisticated production of the hereandnow Theatre Company is tightly directed by Rona Par and produced by Ray Madden at the Armory Center for the Arts, a Pasadena venue for exhibits, events and live performances.

The title of this cabaret act, Neiges D’antan, translates into English as the “snows of yesterday,” and is derived from the show’s opening number, a Bertoldt Brecht/Weill tune called “Nana’s Song”:

“Thank God, everything goes

by so quickly,

both the love and the pain,

too.

Where are last night’s

tears?

Where are the snows of

yesterday?

Where are last night’s

tears?

Where are the snows of

yesterday?”

The tunes include jarring, droll lyrics, such as this caustic refrain from Brecht and Weill’s “Surabaya Johnny” (from the play Happy End): “Take that damn pipe out of your mouth, you rat,” a line Fleming delivers with great panache and wit in the one song she sings.

The show closes with “Youkali,” a song about a make believe Utopia (perhaps that workers’ paradise Weill and Brecht once fought for?) that “means happiness and pleasure, but it’s only a dream, a folly. There is no Youkali.” The surrendering of youthful idealism?

During Ackerman and Fleming’s curtain call, members of the Armory audience stood, applauded, shouted “Bravo!” and “encore,” but alas, the duo missed an ideal opportunity to return onstage and sing Kurt Weill’s most beloved ditty, “Mack the Knife.” It was perversely missing from this production of otherwise little known Weill songs, that contemporary American theatergoers are rarely exposed to.  

Nevertheless, Neiges D’antan is a superb way to “Weill” away the hours and audiences are sure to get far more than their three pennies’ worth out of these musical musings.

Neiges D’antan was presented September 14 - 16 at 8:00 p.m. at the Armory Northwest/Armory Center for the Arts, 145 N. Fair Oaks Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91103 (north of the 210 freeway); (626) 688-7372.