Where are they?

The scene I have decided to base my historical character on is the first time we meet Fraulein Schneider in Act One, Scene Three. The description of the room is described as: The furnishings are ugly and ponderous: a bed, a table with two chairs, an armoire, a coat rack, and, behind a curtain, a washstand. (Masteroff J (1955). Cabaret. New York: Tams-witmark Music Library Inc. 43. Page 11) Although Schneider appears to be proud of her flat the decorations do not seem to suggest this. Because of the economical state of Berlin in the late 1920's I think that Schneider would not have had the money to decorate the house to a high standard that she would be happy with. Furthermore, she will continue to charge high prices for the rooms in order to keep the place running. The description of the room gives the impression of a bleak room as the only verb used to describe the furniture is ugly. This suggests that the room is not nice to look at and gives me the impression of being quite dark with grey colours. The furniture in the room also seems quite basic. The lack of colour and furniture gives the impression that the whole situation in the house is bleak, this could reflect the situation in Germany itself as there was not any money in the country. Things were hard meaning people would try and sell what they had just so they could buy food. Perhaps Schneider had nice furniture but had to sell it in order to make some money. Once Cliff decides on the room, Fraulein Kost comes into the scene saying there isn't any hot water for the second time in the week. This to me suggests that there is a problem with the water system in the flat but because Schneider is alone and doesn't have much money this may not get fixed. Furthermore, the image i get in my head from this scene is one where paint is falling off the wall, no matter how hard the flat is cleaned it is still going to look dirty. Perhaps this is why Schneider appears to be cleaning all the time. 

Fritz Lang and Thea Von Harbou. 1920's. viewed 18/10/14

From the description of the room, I think that it would be a blank canvas for the guest so that they could put their own pieces of art, flowers and anything that reminded them of home into the room. Much like student houses today! The decor would be bland like described. Perhaps this was why Cliff didn't want to pay any more than 50 marks for it.