As of: February 3, 2024, 4:00 p.m
By: Tom Otto
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The tragedy unfolds: The Polish maid (Almut Kohnle, left), who initially sold her newborn child to the childless Jette John (Lisa Flachmeyer), absolutely wants her child back.
© Tom Otto
The premiere of Hauptmann's tragicomedy “The Rats” at the Landestheater Schwaben in Memmingen shows the audience the struggle for social survival in pre-war Germany at the beginning of the 20th century.
Memmingen - Both those who are better off and those who already live in precariat get on the wrong track and have to constantly fight against the slide and social decline.
The stage design created by Dirk Seesemann could not have been more appropriate.
While the former theater director Hassenreuter tries to continue his career at the theater in Strasbourg, the Johns dream of taking part in capitalist rise as a lower-middle-class family.
The tragedy begins when, after the death of her first child, Jette John sees the chance of a “real” family in the unwanted pregnancy of a maid.
The secret deal between the women becomes increasingly difficult to keep hidden, giving birth to new lies and excuses, which further and further drives the isolation of the actors until the tragic end.
Guest actress Lisa Flachmeyer shines in the role of Jette John;
Her posture, gestures, facial expressions and language make the fear, hope, despair and hopelessness of her psyche, already battered by infant death, become flesh.
And while the social gap between the two worlds in the Berlin tenement barracks becomes ever deeper and clearer, the former theater director raves about the aesthetics of the theater in Wilhelmine pre-war Germany.
Ostensibly, it's about the dispute between the naturalists, who want to see theater politically and critically, and the classicists, who uphold Schiller-Goethe-Weimar idealism.
In the debate between the theater director and his acting student about the true and correct theater of the future, director Christine Hofer packs a meta-level that aims at the future programmatic direction of the state theater.
“If German theater wants to recover, it needs other stories and heroes,” it sounds from the stage.
Whether the current situation in Memmingen with the change of director at the end of the season in the summer should also be viewed critically remains Hofer's secret.
After all, the future director Sarah Kohrs announced when she signed her contract at the beginning of last year that, in addition to light entertainment, she also wanted to bring the great classics to the stage.
Feeling the wistful farewell pain at the premiere
It remains to be seen whether this was intended as a contradiction to the current direction of the State Theater.
In any case, at the premiere party that followed, the wistful pain of saying goodbye could already be felt.
For director Hofer, the piece was the last production of her term of office and for Thorsten Hamer, who performed his role as theater director confidently and convincingly as usual, it was the last premiere he played in Memmingen.
More ideas
“The Rats” will be shown in Memmingen on February 17th, 25th and 29th as well as a guest performance on February 3rd in Ottobrunn, on February 23rd in Sonthofen, on March 14th in Kaufbeuren and on April 25th On the mountain.
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