Heavily pregnant in the predatory fish belly: "Sleepless" premiered

It is the constellation of Mary and Joseph.

A heavily pregnant woman and her partner are looking for accommodation in a dismal stranger.

The Norwegian author Jon Fosse lets the couple resort to drastic means.

The successful Hungarian composer Péter Eötvös has expanded the material into the gripping opera “Sleepless”.

He directed the world premiere on Sunday evening in the Berlin State Opera Unter den Linden himself.

Berlin - There was thunderous applause with many shouts of bravo, also for the staging, soloists and the Staatskapelle.

Alida (Victoria Randem) and Asle (Linard Vrielink) arrive in a small town with their rowboat.

In the cold and the desert they find no place to stay for themselves, Alida is about to give birth.

In their desperation they kill and rob.

That gives them shelter, but that's when the problems with the villagers begin.

The internationally celebrated Eötvös is considered one of the formative composers of new music.

He belonged to the Stockhausen Ensemble and worked with Pierre Boulez.

His first major opera, "Drei Schwestern" after Chekhov, was played successfully around the world, in Germany for example in Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Munich and Berlin.

The gloomy and ominously floating sounding “Sleepless” is now his 13th opera.

For each of the scenes he uses a timbre made up of superimposed triads, creating a nightmarish world of tones.

When composing, Eötvös feels, according to his words, “as if I were sitting in the auditorium and looking at the stage, listening to the music and I quickly write down what I see and what I hear”.

He then hears timbre and mixture within himself like a painter who only has colors on his palette that he wants to use.

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For the first time, the Hungarian film and theater director Kornél Mundruczó staged at the State Opera, who last appeared at the Venice and Cannes film festivals with his latest films “Pieces of a Woman” and “Evolution”.

In drastic images he realizes the questions asked by “Sleepless” about guilt and the reaction to it.

For the set design, Monika Pormale built a huge predatory fish on the scenery.

The scaly outer skin is the background for the coldness of street scenes, rejection, loneliness, dreamlike sequences.

The revolving stage also allows a view of the rear.

In the bony interior of the fish belly there is space for the couple's room or for bar encounters with the villagers.

dpa