I Am a Camera

I Am a Camera (1951), a play by John van Druten. [Empire Theatre, 262 perf.; NYDCC Award.] Sitting in his room in Fräulein Schneider's flat in Berlin, the young writer Christopher Isherwood ( William Prince) records his impressions of the city. Although Berlin is disturbed by ominous Nazi rioting, Isherwood notes, “I am a camera, with its shutter open, quite passive.” Some of his carefully nurtured passivity disappears when he is introduced to Sally Bowles ( Julie Harris), an attractive, flamboyant singer at a local night club, and they strike up an immediate friendship. Neither Sally's insistence that Isherwood never ask about her past nor her becoming pregnant by another man seriously affects their relationship. What does come between them is the growing political turmoil. Isherwood elects to leave Berlin, but Sally, as apolitical as she is amoral, chooses to remain. Based on Isherwood's autobiographical Berlin Stories, the play was perceived by many critics as a loosely strung together but theatrically effective series of scenes. To most playgoers its main attraction was Harris's incandescent performance. The play served as the basis for the 1966 musical Cabaret.