The final of Armin Petras in Stuttgart: Schauspiel Stuttgart sings goodbye to Servus – Kultur

Tinsel, critic of capitalism and music: how Armin Petras and the ensemble with "Hello Goodbye" bid farewell to the public after five years of leadership at the Schauspielhaus Stuttgart, which been sold at the last seat.

Stuttgart – The beginning of the end is a speech. The outgoing director Armin Petras is Saturday night at the theater in front of his audience (politicians, celebrities of the city appear only sporadically). He explains how he felt in Stuttgart – "I was good and bad, especially I felt a lot". People had discussed, argued, delighted children, scared subscribers, gained new subscribers, got to know the centers and were wary of the so-called professionals. "

Armin Petras lost amazement

Petras:" We were beaten and courted. "In the meantime, he himself" lost his astonishment in the daily life of this huge enterprise, "admits He wrote an article about it for two years, about an aging artist, his sick child, now he feels better and more beautiful, than the play in an "old little fishing village", namely Berlin (German Theater), listed.

Petras reads on the paper, which shows that he is serious .He stands there now and can not help: "I have to make a speech He said as if to apologize, it had been applied to him by the whole. "Presumably to offer" something heavy content of a senior for seniors ", which brings him first the laughter in the auditorium sold at the last seat of the Schauspielhaus.The director and director, whose criti These have repeatedly reduced the number of spectators, criticizes capitalism and quotes alongside Marx and Artaud the ex-Chancellor Helmut Schmidt: "The reduction of man to the economy is prohibited". But, Petras criticized, the badism of goods had long since arrived at the theater, the theater is consumed as disposable goods. And further: "The art is not a product. Art is a weapon and a tool to understand the world". The art "at 100% use is impossible, but tonight he speaks against."

Kniefall in front of the set

A speech that has similarities with the structure of the Stuttgart Schauspiel: it is badociative, it lacks a bit of order, but it is very personal, sometimes funny and sometimes sad. At the end of the evening, Petras kneels in front of his ensemble with a false pathos that narrows his own role; The artistic director Klaus Dörr distributes roses to the actors, they transmit the flowers to the public. In spite of all self-irony, there is something serious and tragic in this fall that is turning to the audience, namely that as a director, you can only fail. The failure of his own claims, the wishes of the financial guardians, the artists, the expectations of the public. To say nothing of the critics that we sometimes think the night with "murderous fantasies" that are "most often thrown" in the morning.

What does it help? From time to time, rejoice, celebrate, have a "big break," as former star Peter Kurth said, goodbye by video message. Stop the theater, which you can not talk about, you should sing about it: a concert, a best of songs. They can be connected as a souvenir motif with pieces you have to see. Unfortunately, no memory of the evening Witzel and the group or songs with Christian Friedel and his group of "1984" Orwell. For some jokes by Holger Stockhaus in a smart suit on "Swabians looking for pleasure". Scenes with Sandra Gerling, reminiscent of "Uncle Vanya", in which she played with a spectator shuttlebad as in the evening Chekhov in the autumn of 2013. An appearance also of Armin Petras, who tirelessly pulls on the stage, reciting poetry from "1984" Orwell (and later side by side, his ensemble photographed as a tourist on a guided tour).

Music with Miles Perkin and Max Braun

But above all a lot of music, directed by Miles Perkin and Max Braun, family theater songs from "The Wizard of Oz" and "Pünktchen and Anton", and musical productions "Johnny Cash Songbook", "Chelsey Hotel" and "The Cold Heart" – including the performance of the folk dance group Frommern von der Schwäbischen Alb of the Hauff production of Petras. When Caroline Junghanns sang to her tears, beautifully and brilliantly and clearly, "Lisbets Song" from "The Cold Heart", we also remember that we would have liked to see this actress more often. Audience continues, applauds, whistles as actors roar, languish, rock, from "Highway To Hell" to Rio Reisers – "It's over, egg, egg, egg" – song "Junimond"

Complete of gold garlands and confetti, after two and a half hours, the spectators, who have jumped for a long time, applaud some with Hans-Moser-Servus "If the goddess wants the net" and Mitsing-Schmusseong "Uhhh Uhhh Uhhh ". A successful final, a little sad like almost all goodbyes. On a new one with the next director, who also has a prolonged renovation in front of him, the house can open in November and before his audience sends to an artistic event in "The Pit" in front of the Schauspielhaus.