The first question to arise upon hearing of “Marx in Soho,” a play by Howard Zinn, would naturally be this: why is there a play of Karl Marx and his ideas at this time? It has been over a hundred and fifty years after the Communist Manifesto, and with the dictatorship in the name of communism displayed in Russia, China and North Korea, the general public does not regard Marx with a positive light.

This did not stop Bob Weick, in his act as Karl Marx, in fiercely defending the revolutionary socialist. Alone on the stage, he paced around in a heated one-sided discussion on Marx’s ideas. It was a one-man play; Weick was the only one on the stage, and he was the only one who talked throughout the whole show. There was no evident involvement of the audience, aside from showing them simple props of books and articles, and shouting out questions with no expected contributions.

This forced the focus onto Marx’s ideas. His personal life and context of the time were used only to provide challenges and support to his arguments. This was also aligned to Weick’s argument that the ideas are separate from the person—that personal flaws are not necessarily linked to the arguments presented by the person, and the time in which the ideas were spawned does not necessary limit them to the era. In other words, that ideas are immortal.

The setup of the stage, which consisted only of simple props, two chairs and a table, and a stool in a corner, is also notable in its simplicity. The empty chair and the scarf placed upon it alluded to the second character—Marx’s wife, Jenny—but only enough to enforce Marx’s quality as a round, sympathetic character. His costume was not very dramatic at all, either, and none of the colors were very vivid. The simplicity not only assisted the focus on the ideas rather than the setting or the story, but also made the play more relatable for the present. There were few details to make the audience belittle the play into a theoretical story of a time gone past, nor was the modernity of it forced enough to be unconvincing.

What more could prove the immediate relevance to Marx’s ideas, theories and his criticisms than the sheer consecutive size of the audience that enabled Weick to perform the same show, over 250 times so far? Every detail of the show was designed to be relatable—to convince the audience that Marx and his writings are still relevant to this time, and are crucial for insightful searches into the system of modern world. And on this mark, it was definitely successful—the people walked out of the play wondering why, and how, the problems stated by a man who had lived nearly two hundred years ago, are still far from solved in the twenty-first century.

In Howard Zinn’s Marx in Soho performed by Bob Weick, Karl Marx was introduced to the 21^st century world, in which capitalism and money still rules.  Money exists as the anchor of 21^st century society, and while people that have money are loving the idea and stability of capitalism, the poor despise the current system.  Capitalism exists as a way for the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer in Marx’s eyes.  It exists as a way for people to squander their gains and simply consume.  In the play, Marx tells that capitalism does not create citizens, but rather consumers.  Advertising is an attribute to humans being consumers rather than citizens because it attacks people’s vulnerabilities and forces people to consume what they want instead of what they might need.  As long as people keep spending more and more money, the corporations of the world will profit and be happy while the rest of the world, which is the majority, suffers tremendously in this capitalistic society.

In the play, Marx’s flaws as a man and a father, but also flaws in his ideas.  Marx had no way of telling the future, but he thought that after a revolution occurred, the people would take to rule and there would be his dream of a dictatorship of the proletariat.  This idea was one that Marx did not have a complete understanding over at the time because even though a dictatorship run by the people or the proletariat is a revolutionary idea, it simply cannot be attained.  In the play, Bakunin, a revolutionary Russian anarchist, asserted that Marx’s idea of a dictatorship of the proletariat is simply unattainable because no dictatorship has ever lasted and the proletariat did not have the ability to rule a whole society.  Putting people in power that have never experienced power before is a risky situation because they will abuse their new found power without realizing the consequences of their decisions.

Bob Weick’s performance as Karl Marx in the play Marx in Soho, by Howard Zinn, shines a light on the man behind the controversial ideas and shows how relevant his ideas are in our world today. Communism is associated with either corrupt leaders or tumultuous times in history. Marx is thought of as a madman, who should be feared because of his radical views. Weick shatters this stereotype and shows a different side of Marx. His concern as a father is clear as he introduces his three children. He promotes his thoughts because he believes they will allow his children to have a better life. His adoration for his wife is evident as he lovingly recalls her endless support of his work. Most importantly, he shows his humbleness as he regrets his infidelity and his inability to provide for his family. He is not this untouchable figure who thinks he is superior to everyone. Marx is only a person who wants to the world to reach its full potential.

This play forces the audience to confront reality and see the validity in Marx’s view: that capitalism is killing society with its voracious appetite for more. Some disregard his ideas because they fail to see how applicable they are in our world. However, his ideology may have even more truth now than it did when he wrote it. Those who hold all the money and power are few and far between. The majority works for the advancement of the minority and receive very little in return. The solution to this fraudulent system seems easy yet we have been brainwashed into thinking there is no necessity for a solution. Thus, Weick preaches these ideas in the hopes of provoking a response from the audience and helping them discover the root problem.

Marx in Soho is a unique play that showcases Karl Marx’s life and ideas with a twenty first century application . Marx in Soho illustrates the flaws in capitalism that have continued into the twenty first century such as overproduction and the disparity in wealth between classes leading to massive social and economic problems in the future for society.
In modern day America, the overproduction of goods is a major problem, discussed by Marx. This materialistic idea hurts the proletariat because an increase in production reduces the wages of the workers in order to keep the capitalists (Bourgeoisie) gaining a profit. This has lead to a growing gap between the classes which some think as insurmountable. Capitalism is fair to the bourgeoisie who control the flow of capital, and refuse to share their wealth evenly for the benefit of society. Hoarding wealth causes poverty and a decline in education. These problems do not affect the rich capitalists who generate their profits from the poor proletariat.
The statistic that 49 percent of the United States wealth is controlled by 1 percent of the population is evidence Marx’s was right about capitalism. Capitalism has the bad habit of prioritizing profit over the well being of workers. When this profit is held by few, it creates problems for the rest of the country and economy. Much of this wealth is not cycled through the nation, and prevents the growth of: schools, businesses, and the economy. This creates a gap between the bourgeoisie and proletariat while shrinking the middle class down to almost nothing. When the middle class shrinks, the consumer base shrinks while the rich are unable to create the capital needed to sustain their business model. In the United States these problems are evident by the idea of falling into a depression or recession, because the rich 1 percent have few restrictions on their trade and business.
Marx in Soho’s main goal was to paint the picture of the twenty first century in terms of Marx ideas. He intended to create a dialogue of the current and past problems of capitalism.

The nineteenth-century based play Marx in Soho written by Howard Ziin is performed by Bob Weick, a monologist, who interprets philosopher Karl Marx’s life and relates it to twenty-first century America. Through satirical and witty rhetoric, Bob Weick emphasizes how humans create social institutions based on economic factors resulting in income inequality and class division. Under these conditions a minority of the population control a disproportionate amount of economic power over the masses breeding poverty and oppression in both the nineteenth and twenty-first century.

Throughout the play, Bob Weick, as Karl Marx, explains how the social structures in the nineteenth century and the twenty-first century are similar in that the wealth gap continues to widen creating an impoverished, powerless, and uninformed working class. Mr. Weick makes the case that while in the twenty-first century the United State’s Gross Domestic Product is around 5,000 billion dollars, only one percent of the population controls half of the nation’s wealth. To have the top one percent of the population hold the majority of the wealth emphasizes the severity of the growing wealth gap. An effect of having a minority population of ultra rich and a majority population of poor leads to worsening drug and alcohol abuses, overcrowded prisons, and flawed public education institutions. In fact, nineteenth century Europe is not so different, in terms of income inequality, as twenty-first century America. In Europe, the working class was viewed as expendable given just enough money to meet the bare minimum requirements that a human being needs to survive.

Marx explains how capitalism continues to triumph in the twenty-first century and will continue to “breed rebellion”. The disproportionate lack of power that the working class has in the nineteenth and twenty-first century will precipitate social, economic, and political inequality until the rise of a communist revolution.

The performance of Howard Zinn’s play, Marx in Soho, portrayed the issues of the nineteenth-century in the context of modern day to highlight the underlying problems that still prevent society from advancing. The actor of Karl Marx, Bob Weick, targeted the audience of primarily college students and college professors by focusing on problems that are ordinarily either overlooked or simply ignored by ignorance. In doing so, this motivated the audience to think about social and economic issues while watching the performance, which created an even greater desire to evaluate and promote further change. Marx offered the solution of analyzing the root of the problem instead of blindly acting on fallacies, which was performed through passionate acting by changing the pitch and speed of his voice to adjust the mood of the theater. Bob Weick specifically captivated the audience through comical and relatable acting techniques in order to inspire the radical ideas of Karl Marx, which in turn prompted younger generations to take measures to instigate change in society.

Many of the same problems that Marx addressed still exist and are progressively worsening in America today, which is why the material is still relevant to the current system. Marx critiqued the capitalist society of the nineteenth-century, but Weick also incorporated the current election, confused political leaders, and large companies holding control over the “free markets” to show that the issues have evolved into newer forms. Weick specifically targeted Donald Trump and Walmart in order to single out giants that have influenced America, which would most likely be critiqued by Marx if he were alive today. Although one is not meant to leave the play enraged by these social figures, they are presented in order to get the audience to question these figures legitimate role in the economy. Thus, change is simply sparked by asking questions about modern figures, regardless of whether a revolution arises.

Marx in Soho is a play by Bob Weick that inter-twines Marx into the 21^st century, the main trend of the piece is to show that the revolution never occurred. Marx argues with Bakunin that “La Commune de Paris” was the only society close to his teachings. But capitalism works on oppressing others in order to keep its current system intact as such the commune was crushed.

Karl Marx shows the audience how he used to argue with Mikhail Bakunin a Russian anarchist that had very set ideas about the revolution. Bakunin disputed that the revolution must be fought by the people. Furthermore Bakunin believed that all state and form of government should be abolished. Marx strongly refuted this point by saying that capitalism cannot simply vanish it must transition into a workers state[i], he proceeds to speak about “La Commune de Paris” which to him was the only time that his views ever came to light. In 1871 Paris united under a free commune that democratically appointed its representatives, who were not chosen by the bourgeoisie but by the people they included individuals of the working class but also some intellectuals.[ii] This group of individuals was the epitome of Marx’s dream. However “La Commune de Paris” was crushed by capitalism, as the armies rolled back into Paris they executed 10,000 to 25,000 people. Thus capitalism and the bourgeoisie were reinstalled and much to Marx’s disgust it would remain so.

In conclusion Marx in Soho outlines trends that are still occurring to this day. His revolution never occurred and the only time that it did, it was crushed under foot by capitalism. The 21^st century may or may not see Marx’s much wanted revolution, but Marx in Soho is piece that instigates the audience into action and into understanding that our society is unhealthy and needs to be cured from the disease of capitalism.

[i] Robertson, Ann, December 2003, the Philosophical Roots of the Marx-Bakunin Conflict,

  https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/bakunin/bio/robertson-ann.htm ( accessed September 30, 2015)

[ii] Les acteurs de la commune, “Histoire Du Monde”

http://www.histoiredumonde.net/Les-acteurs-de-la-Commune.html (accessed September 30, 2015 )