A project by Christoph Marthaler and Anna Viebrock
A musical-dramatic contemplation of the last days of consumption. What will come after? A corrupt and claustrophobic life system with company and family hierarchies tries to protect assets and hierarchies. More and more security, wiretapping and surveillance equipment is installed. Actually, there is nothing left to protect and guard anymore, although of course nobody would even dream of saying so. The greater the anxiety, the more drastic the incursions into tills and the stockpiling. They fall asleep in contemporary Western European luxury and wake up in a flophouse, still babbling snippets of marketing strategies because they cannot conceive of anything else.
In German with Greek surtitles.
Directed by
Stage design
Anna Viebrock, Thilo Albers
Costume design
Sarah Schittek
Artistic colloborator
Gerhard Alt
Music director
Christoph Homberger
Dramaturgy and texts
Stefanie Carp
Lighting design
Phoenix (Andreas Hofer)
Make-up
Christian Schilling
Assistant Stage Designer
Blanka Rádóczy
Assistant Costume Designer
Claudia Ungersbäck
Light head technicians
Jan Wagner, Victor Duran
Sound head technician
Ernst Zettl, Volker Werner
Technical crew
Peter Walz (Technical Director), Franz Jackel (also props), Antony
Osborne, Claude Nikiema, Volker Stieblich
Surtitles
Yannis Kalifatidis
Music
Claudio Monteverdi
Duet "Pur ti miro..."
From
L’incoronazione di Poppea (SV 308)
Johann Sebastian Bach
10. Coro
- "Die Katze lässt das Mausen nicht" (A cat its mousing never quits)
From
The Coffee Cantata (BWV 211)
- "Deposuit potentes"
From
Magnificat in D major (BWV 243)
- Chorale prelude "Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme" (Wake up, the voice calls to us) (BWV 645), transcribed for piano by Ferruccio Busoni
Ludwig van Beethoven
Finale "O welche Lust"
From
Fidelio (op. 72)
Robert Schumann
"Am leuchtenden Sommermorgen" (The glowing summer morning)
"Ich hab’ im Traum geweinet (I was weeping in my dream)"
From
Dichterliebe (The Poet’s Love) (op. 48)
Lyrics
Heinrich Heine
Gustav Mahler
"Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis" (Every fleeting thing is but an appearance)
From
Symphony No. 8
Lyrics
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Adapted by Jan Czajkowski
Erik Satie
Messe des Pauvres (Mass for the Poor)
Franz Paul Fiebrich
"In der Fassbindergass’n" (In barrel-makers’ lane)
From
Eduard Kremser
Wiener Lieder und Tänze (Viennese Songs and Dances), Vol. 3, p. 58 ff.
Alban Berg
"Dem Schmerz sein Recht" (Giving pain its due)
From
Four Songs for Voice and Piano (op. 2/1)
Lyrics
Friedrich Hebbel
Norbert Schultze
Lili Marleen
Lyrics
Hans Leip
Bee Gees (Robin Gibb)
Staying Alive
Other adaptations
Bendix Dethleffsen, Christoph Homberger
The lyrics also feature the five poems by Elfriede Gerstl
ich bin so frei, warum bin ich ich, anrufung der grossen putze, vögelfrei – eine spruchsammlung, k. wünscht sich eine neue enzyklopädie, from “neue wiener mischung” © Literaturverlag Droschl Graz-Vienna 2001. Passage from Seneca’s "On the Brevity of Life" from
"On the Happy Life", German translation Stuttgart 1978 (courtesy of Alfred Körner Verlag). Immanuel Kant
"The Categorical Imperative".
Cast
A Frenchman who has lost his way: Marc Bodnar
A security guard: Raphael Clamer
Pianist: Bendix Dethleffsen
A woman in search of the past: Silvia Fenz
A precocious girl: Olivia Grigolli
Song co-ordinator: Christoph Homberger
A worried man on the phone: Ueli Jäggi
A childlike man/keyboard player: Jürg Kienberger
A nail-care studio owner: Katja Kolm
A savings bank employee: Bernhard Landau
A fortune-hunter: Barbara Nüsse
A bad girl: Sasha Rau
An executive in the making: Lars Rudolph
A reasonable man/keyboard player: Clemens Sienknecht
A consumption seeker: Bettina Stucky
Produced by
Wiener Festwochen 2009, Vienna
Co-produced by
Napoli Teatro Festival Italia, Athens Festival, Festival d’Avignon, Miedzynarodowy Festiwal Teatralny DIAOLOG-WROCLAW, Theater Chur
Riesenbutzbach. Eine Dauerkolonie received its world premiere on May 10th, 2009 at Roesenhuegel Studios / Hall 1 in Vienna.
