Max Frisch (1911-1991) was a diagnostician of human fallibility and social suffering. However, the Swiss writer and playwright did not see himself as a therapist, he never suggested solutions. His play “Biedermann und die Brandstifter” (first performed in 1958), which premiered on Saturday in the Linzer Schauspielhaus, should also be seen in this light. And yes, after these 100 concentrated minutes, Frisch would have applauded director Stephan Suschke.
With “Lehrstück ohne Lehr” (teaching play without teaching), Frisch slammed an addition into the sub-line for his bourgeois man, which works out a counterpoint to the theatrical work of Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), whom he admired. The audience may think up their own answers, they don’t get any from Frisch. So, on the one hand, one might think of dictators who, from Hitler to Putin, have all too often said what they intend to do. They just didn’t believe them.
On the other hand, we think about the democratic tolerance with which obvious arsonists from the extreme right and left are supposed to be led into the middle of society on the basis of conservative pleas for tolerance. Frisch points to all of this without saying so explicitly.
Without directorial frills
As in his remarkable Thomas Bernhard productions, it is a good thing that Suschke is an old-school director. He unfolds the power of the word, the work of art language, without staged frills. Suschke tells the story. It won’t rain trophies for that in the freaky world of theater awards, but acting has done a service.
For this project, Suschke has sought first-class comrades-in-arms: Christian Higer, for example, who, as a conservative, has transformed himself from an unscrupulous hair tonic manufacturer into a kipper who serves the arsonists Schmitz (Alexander Hetterle) and Eisenring (Sebastian Hufschmidt). Hetterle is a fine dumb scoundrel and ex-wrestler with no ideological background. Hufschmidt, a devious convict with a waiter’s past, provides him with a congenial partner.
Is it the appeals to humanity or the fear of confrontation, why Biedermann lets the Gfraster and petrol barrels into their own four walls? Only the good Angela Waidmann, as Biedermann’s wife Babette, preserves a hint of resistance despite her bourgeois demeanor, displayed in the form of residual sorrow. As the maid Anna, Charlotte Kaiser is annoyed by both Biedermann and the guests.
With the attic dwelling for the arsonists, Momme Röhrbein has built a coherently elevated level above the barren stage. Angelika Rieck’s costumes are based on the normality of the present. The brass quartet with Gottfried Reiter (trumpet), Joachim Werner (alto saxophone), Siegfried Emil Doppler (alto horn) and Christian Groffner (trombone) provides the opposition sound to the catastrophic spiral.
In accordance with its nature, the fire brigade choir (leader Eva-Maria Aichner) always comes too late. The four male extras speak mainly in the broad dialect. This gets in the way of intelligibility, but reinforces Frisch’s idea of the comic element – in contrast to the anxious comments of the Greek chorus of ancient tragedies. In the end, the chief ideologue Dr. Warn Phil (Lutz Zeidler/also a policeman), no matter how stuttering, of the spirits that have been summoned. Nobody hears him anymore. The fuse is already burning. Long applause.
Source: Nachrichten
