The opera opens with a projection of a “wanted” sign. On this sign the pictures of three characters appear: Ladybird Begbick, Trinity Moses and Henry Wilson alias Fatty The Bookie along with the description of their crime. The music begins before the projection is revealed and continues until the projection screen flies out and Scene One begins. The music never stops during this transition.

The title of the first scene is projected in red.

On an empty desert three characters arrive on stage driving a battered truck.

Once the title of this scene has vanished, the music begins and the girls come out from stage left towards center singing the Alabama song with their suitcases. They are dressed with sexy undergarments inspired by 1940’s lingerie. Their performance resembles a cabaret dance and their attitude is flirtatious towards the audience. Simultaneously, the shadow play is showing Mahagonny being built with huge geometrical shapes.

As the shadow play screen flies out, the stage remains almost dark and we can only see the silhouette of an architectural model of a city bathed in a soft pool of light. No one is yet on stage. When Trinity Moses and Fatty The Bookie appear on stage the light changes into a night scene in a city. The two actors have cameras and what they are filming is being projected live on a screen behind them.

Coming from stage left four male characters—Jimmy Gallagher, Alaska Wolf Joe, John Jacob Smith and Bookkeeping Billy—enter playing instruments along with the orchestra. They are heading towards Mahagonny.

Jimmy Gallagher and his friends arrive in Mahagonny. They meet Lady Begbick, Fatty and Moses and they are also introduced to “The Girls of Mahagonny”

Jimmy and Jenny, walking on a street in Mahagonny

The “As You Like It Tavern”. Lady Begbick runs in to tell Fatty and Moses that they’re having a crisis: people are leaving Mahagonny and prices have started to plummet.

We are back at the quay near Mahagonny. A staircase is placed next to the boat and people are boarding ready to leave the city

A piano starts playing, lights come up revealing Jimmy and his friends sitting in front of the As You Like It Tavern smoking cigarettes and listening to the music.

The characters watch the projection astonished while singing: “No! not utter destruction, our golden Joytown will be lost.”

The people of Mahagonny are sitting on the floor while the chorus of men is passing behind the scrim with lit candles singing:

Stout be your hearts though dark be the night, Stand though the sun and the moon take to flight: Hence with idle wailing,
Tears are unavailing; Face the fury of the storm and fight!

The hurricane gets closer and closer to Mahagonny

In this scene Jake is eating incessantly while the other characters watch him eat.

A prostitute, a man and Begbick appear on the platform. The lights are dim. Begbick gives instructions to the gentleman, while, on a bench attached to the platform, a line of men is impatiently waiting for their turn.

The platform is rotated once again and under Fatty’s supervision a boxing ring is erected.

A bar is set on stage.

Jimmy chained to a tree comes in from stage right, pushing a tree as he is walking center stage. Once he is center, he sits on the floor and begins his aria.

The title is projected. Act Three begins in a courtroom.

Jenny, Begbick, Fatty, Bill, Moses and Toby enter in front of the screen carrying stools and singing the Benares song.

EXECUTION OF JIMMY GALLAGHER. MANY OF YOU, PERHAPS, WILL BE SHOCKED AT WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO SEE. BUT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, ASK YOURSELVES THIS QUESTION: “WOULD I HAVE PAID JIMMY GALLAGHER’S DEBTS?’ WOULD YOU? ARE YOU SURE?