The Threepenny Opera
1995-01-01 · 163 min · ★ 9.0
The Threepenny Opera proclaims itself "an opera for beggars," and it was in fact an attempt both to satirize traditional opera and operetta and to create a new kind of musical theater based on the theories of two young German artists, composer Kurt Weill and poet-playwright Bert Brecht. The show opens with a mock-Baroque overture, a nod to Threepenny's source, The Beggar's Opera, a brilliantly successful parody of Handel's operas written by John Gay in 1728. In a brief prologue following the overture, a shabby figure comes onstage with a barrel organ and launches into a song chronicling the crimes of the notorious bandit and womanizer Macheath, "Mack the Knife." The setting is a fair in Soho (London), just before Queen Victoria's coronation. In this production, Weill champion HK Gruber led the Ensemble Modern in a performance of Weill's complete original score, the first time it had been heard in Germany in many years. This production was broadcast on German television (3sat).
Trailers are previews, not full movies.
No authorized playback source configured. Use the legal watch options below.
Production details
- Directors
- Hans Hollmann, Barrie Gavin
- Production companies
- 3sat
- Countries
- Germany
- Status
- Released
Top Cast
Friedrich Karl PraetoriusMacheath, genannt Mackie Messer
Jürgen HoltzJonathan Jeremiah Peachum
Dorothee HartingerLucy, seine Tochter
Carola RegnierDie Spelunken-Jenny
Stephan GrossmannFilch / Trauerweiden-Walter
Jörg PoseMakenfinger-Jakob
Waldemar KobusSäge-RobertTitle information and images are supplied by TMDb. Explore our discovery guide for advice on comparing metadata and legal viewing options.
Where to watch
Availability provided by JustWatch via TMDb. Offers can change. Provider links are listed on TMDb; full playback requires a separately authorized source.
Availability not listed for this country.
Seasons & episodes
Recommendations

As celebrated conductor Lydia Tár starts rehearsals for a career-defining symphony, the consequences of her past choices begin to echo in the present.

Disciplined Italian composer Antonio Salieri becomes consumed by jealousy and resentment towards the hedonistic and remarkably talented young Salzburger composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

This film follows the remarkable and inspirational true story of Paul Potts, a shy, bullied shop assistant by day and an amateur opera singer by night.

The Marx Brothers take on high society and the opera world to bring two lovers together. A sly business manager and two wacky friends of two opera singers help them achieve success while humiliating their stuffy and snobbish enemies.

A famous pianist at the twilight of his career meets a free-spirited music critic who soon becomes his rock as his mental state deteriorates.

A melancholy poet reflects on three women he loved and lost in the past: a mechanical performing doll, a Venetian courtesan, and the consumptive daughter of a celebrated composer.

The Marx Brothers help young Broadway hopefuls when they get mixed up with gangsters due to a tin of sardines containing Romanoff diamonds.

When the beloved cellist of a world-renowned string quartet is diagnosed with a life threatening illness, the group's future suddenly hangs in the balance as suppressed emotions, competing egos and uncontrollable passions threaten to derail years of friendship and collaboration. As they are about to play their 25th anniversary concert — quite possibly their last — only their intimate bond and the power of music can preserve their legacy.

Maria Callas, the world's greatest opera singer, lives the last days of her life in 1970s Paris, as she confronts her identity and life.

By the year 2056, an epidemic of organ failures has devastated the planet. The megacorporation GeneCo provides organ transplants on a payment plan — and those unable to fulfill their plans have their organs repossessed. In the midst of this, a sickly teenager discovers a shocking secret about herself, her father, and their connection to GeneCo.

In 19th-century Hungary, Romantic composer/pianist Franz Liszt struggles to end his hedonistic ways but keeps getting sucked back in by his seductive fellow composer, Richard Wagner.

Ghost is an ideological musician and leader of a jazz band who would rather play his blues in the park to the birds than compromise himself. His peripatetic performances lead him to cross paths with a singer, while his masculinity is thrown into question following a violent brawl.

Inside the Kit Kat Club of 1931 Berlin, starry-eyed singer Sally Bowles and an impish emcee sound the clarion call to decadent fun, while outside a certain political party grows into a brutal force.

After failing to make it on Broadway, April returns to her hometown and reluctantly begins training a misfit group of young dancers for a competition.

In the years before World War II, a tomboyish postulant at an Austrian abbey is hired as a governess in the home of a widowed naval captain with seven children and brings a new love of life and music into the home.

Vitus tells the story of a highly-gifted boy (played by real-life piano prodigy Teo Gheorghiu) whose parents have demanding and ambitious plans for him.

A down-on-his-luck coach is hired to prepare a team of the best American dancers for an international tournament that attracts all the best crews from around the world, but the Americans haven't won in fifteen years.

The story of seven scholars in search of an expert to teach them about swing music. They seem to have found the perfect candidate in winsome nightclub singer Honey Swanson. But Honey's gangster boyfriend doesn't want to give her up.

Talented but self-centered trumpeter Bleek Gilliam is obsessed with his music and indecisiveness about his girlfriends Indigo and Clarke. But when he is forced to come to the aid of his manager and childhood friend, Bleek finds his world more fragile than he ever imagined.

A snobbish phonetics professor agrees to a wager that he can take a flower girl and make her presentable in high society.
Similar titles

A 12-year-old boy tries everything to join a music lovers club.

Clark Terry has been described as 'possessor of the happiest sound in jazz'. A veteran of Duke Ellington's orchestra, he began to perform as a soloist in the sixties and established a reputation as one of the great teachers of jazz music, which continues to the present day. In this performance from 1977, he is joined by an all star band including Oscar Peterson, Ronnie Scott, Niels Pedersen, Joe Pass, Bobby Durnham and Milt Jackson.

A version of Benjamin Britten's opera based on the Melville story. Will the virtuous young sailor Billy Budd be hanged for murder?

Experience the electrifying concert film capturing Twenty One Pilots at a career-defining moment: their monumental Mexico City headline show, performing in front of 65,000 fans at Estadio GNP Seguros during The Clancy World Tour. Set against the vibrant pulse of one of the world’s most iconic music capitals, the film blends cinematic high-energy performance footage with intimate, behind-the-scenes access, revealing the heart, humor, and humanity of the artists as they prepare for one of the biggest shows of their career.

SM Entertainment girl group aespa launched their first worldwide tour SYNK: HYPER LINE in 2023. For the Japan leg of the tour, the girls held 12 concerts including shows in Osaka, Saitama, Nagoya and Tokyo. This release features full recordings of two aespa performances at Saitama Super Arena in April and Tokyo Dome in June!

On a January night in 1985, music's biggest stars gathered to record "We Are the World." This documentary goes behind the scenes of the historic event.

With his affinity for the 16th-century sculptor Benvenuto Cellini's advocacy of artistic and personal freedom, Hector Berlioz went straight for the grand gesture with his first completed opera. Returning to it years after initial production debacles, Berlioz stated that he would 'never again find such verve and Cellinian impetuosity, nor such a variety of ideas.' The plot revolves around Cellini's wooing of Teresa, a match frustrated at every opportunity by his rival, the cowardly Fieramosca. Benvenuto Cellini is a pithy work combining romance, excitement, violence, comedy and spectacle; the perfect stage for Terry Gilliam's stylishly colorful and larger than life directing.

An excellent performance of this delightful opera. The principals are superb, especially the sisters. Bruscantini as Don Alfonso is past his prime, but he knows and understands the role inside out, so one does not even notice his vocal limitations. Araiza is in top form as Ferrando, and Morris makes virile Guglielmo. The only disappointment is Battle as Despina. Unlike her partners, she does not have feel for the Mozart ensemble, and her vocal mannerisms are totally unbecoming. How the producers allowed that to happen is a mystery. Muti's conducting is terrific, much better than on his La Scala video, where he is uninvolved.

A documentary of the band Boundaries' sold out 2024 album release tour with Orthodox, Kaonashi and No Cure.

La Cenerentola, ossia La bontà in trionfo (Cinderella, or Goodness Triumphant) is an operatic dramma giocoso in two acts by Gioachino Rossini. The libretto was written by Jacopo Ferretti, based on the fairy tale Cendrillon by Charles Perrault. The opera was first performed in Rome's Teatro Valle on 25 January 1817.---- IMDB id refers to Great Performances: Season 24, Episode 12 La Cenerentola (3 Apr. 1996) from Houston Grand Opera so release date is misleading.

Recorded between 1994 and 1998, The Actuality of Thought documents live performances from the mid-90s American emo/hardcore scene.

One of the most recognizable voices in all of modern day music, Dua Lipa quickly rose to fame. Her catchy tunes and sultry vocals make her music appeal to a global audience.

Seattle’s swampy rivers and wild forests set an atmospheric scene for the tale of Earth – the slowest metal band on earth – which created the drone metal genre, was an inspiration to the grunge rock scene and had an unfortunate hand in Kurt Cobain’s death.

Manchester, 1976. Tony Wilson is an ambitious but frustrated local TV news reporter looking for a way to make his mark. After witnessing a life-changing concert by a band known as the Sex Pistols, he persuades his station to televise one of their performances, and soon Manchester's punk groups are clamoring for him to manage them. Riding the wave of a musical revolution, Wilson and his friends create the legendary Factory Records label and The Hacienda club.

A "beneath the surface" look at the story of the band Snah Morfar, how it came to be, and how it all fell apart before it even began. Through one-on-one interviews with each member of the band, and statements made by people from the same circle, this is the real story of Snah Morfar.

Larion Dyakov is a painter, but he doesn't use paint; instead, he "paints pictures through music." He plays the viola and connects it to a chain of various effects devices to loop his phrases and alter the original sound of his classical instrument. The result is a mixture of classical and modern ambient music that can transport you to another world and paint a new picture in your mind's eye, if you let it.

Follow the journey of a young guitar player through the years.

L'Incoronazione di Poppea by Monteverdi is the last Opera of the Monteverdi trilogy filmed by the Italian label and producer Dynamic at the Teatro Real, Madrid, May 2010.

From the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma Terme di Caracalla "Carmen" by Georges Bizet. Director Jesus Lopez-Cobos. Orchestra, Chorus and Corps de Ballet of the Teatro dell'Opera di Roma.