The chaos of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera unleashes impertinent fury into UCSB’s Performing Arts Theatre, a triumphantly seedy circus of crime and extortion run by dueling ringmasters: Captain Macheath (Vivian Oxley) and Jonathan Peachum (Jake Marshall). These underworld criminals, sex workers, and beggars live years in only a few days — as one does when life is cheap and tomorrow isn’t presumed.

There is much to love about this department production (adapted by Simon Stephens, directed by Annie Torsiglieri), but Oxley’s performance as the slick and brutal Captain Macheath is at the top of the list. Oxley seductively accomplishes the magic trick of the character: Making the audience believe that Mac “the Knife” is, in fact, as charming and charismatic as the characters onstage lead us to believe. Mac is a cult hero because the script says so — but for the illusion to hit, the audience must also take the bait, forgiving this magnetic criminal even his most cruel betrayals. Suffused with passion (madness?), Oxley’s Macheath is nigh unstoppable, moving from one doomed relationship to the next, never truly able to ungrasp his conquests. This fever is illustrated through intense and insightful choreography by Christina McCarthy, including a twisted, intimate wartime re-enactment and a brothel ballroom twirl that conjures the hungry anticipation of a tango and the violence of a Danse Apache.

The opening night performance increased in strength over time and cast conviction at the top of Act II was where it should have been at Act I, but first performances sometimes take a couple of scenes to hit stride. Threepenny Opera is a compelling story of influence and squalor that continues to be edgy despite the fact that the message in the bottle is coming from a century ago. 

See the show on campus through November 23. For tickets and information click here.