Meininger
The Meininger was called the ensemble cast of the Meininger Court Theater , which from 1874 to 1890 with 81 guest performances with the modern director's theater a profound theater reform across Europe presented. Under the direction of the director and later artistic director Ludwig Chronegk , they inspired the theater world of that time and celebrated great successes.
history
see also: The Meininger Theater - Theater Duke to Meininger Principles
Between 1869 and 1874, Duke Georg II of Saxony-Meiningen, in collaboration with the director Ludwig Chronegk and his wife and actress Ellen Franz (from 1873 Helene Freifrau von Heldburg ), carried out a far-reaching theater reform based on the Meiningen principles at the theater in his royal seat of Meiningen . George II was a very artistic monarch with a great predilection for drama . With great commitment and considerable financial resources, he campaigned for the long overdue renewal of this theater genre.
The theater reform could not be enforced with the appearances alone at the Meiningen court theater, despite extensive reviews of the major newspapers. The Duke was soon planning a series of guest performances in the major theatrical metropolises. With Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare, this reform was made known to the general public for the first time during the guest performance of the Meininger Ensemble on May 1, 1874 in the Friedrich Wilhelmstadt Theater in Berlin .
In the years that followed, the actors of the Meiningen Court Theater and their entourage traveled to 38 European cities in 16 years with a logistical masterpiece. Seven guest tours were made to Berlin alone. Several crossings to London were also carried out. 41 works by various masters, particularly by Shakespeare and Schiller, were performed at 2,591 performances. The tour company, consisting of 70 to 80 people, carried 15 to 20 carriages full of decorations, props and costumes. In the guest venues, the magnificent costumes true to the original, realistically harmonious backdrops and impressive crowd scenes caused a sensation during the performances.
These tours were groundbreaking in other areas as well. Logistically , the emerging European rail network was used for the first time on a large scale for such an extensive company. Customs and import regulations had to be reinterpreted in certain countries, which the government of the Duchy of Meiningen negotiated with the respective other states on the basis of special conditions. Since George II was also a ruling duke , he never took part in a tour himself. All missions were led by Ludwig Chronegk.
A number of young and later famous actors began their careers while they were traveling and received excellent training from Georg's wife, Helene Freifrau von Heldburg , née Ellen Franz. They included Josef Kainz , Adele Sandrock , Bjørn Bjørnson and Albert Bassermann . A US tour planned from October 1886 to April 1887 and already signed by contract, with 150 performances in numerous large cities on the east coast, had to be canceled because of a long and serious illness of Chronegk. Chronegk did not recover from this illness, he died on July 9, 1891.
The other theaters in Europe soon learned from the Meiningen reforms and acted out them. Encouraged by Meininger , Charles Edward Flower founded the Royal Shakespeare Company's predecessor , the Shakespeare Memorial Theater, in England in 1879 .
On July 1, 1890, the Meininger in Odessa gave their last guest performance with Shakespeare's What you want , the cultural mission was fulfilled. A quote from Otto Brahm aptly proves this: “They died of success”. Although the long travel time caused high costs for the duchy, the box office results brought great financial success. For many years after this period of travel, it was still an honor for actors to play at the Meininger Hoftheater and in the theater world the theater ensemble was still respectfully known as the “Meininger”.
Performed works
- William Shakespeare : Julius Caesar (Drama), What You Want, The Merchant of Venice , Hamlet , King Lear , A Winter's Tale .
- Friedrich Schiller : Wallenstein Trilogy, The Maid of Orleans , Wilhelm Tell , The Robbers , The Fiesco Conspiracy to Genoa and Maria Stuart .
- Heinrich von Kleist : Prince Friedrich von Homburg , Die Hermannsschlacht and Das Käthchen von Heilbronn .
- Franz Grillparzer : The ancestor and Esther
- Goethe : Iphigenia on Tauris
- Molière : The conceited sick person and the misanthrope
- Gotthold Ephraim Lessing : Nathan the wise
- Henrik Ibsen : The crown pretenders and ghosts
- Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson : Between the battles
- and another 15 works, among others by Pius Alexander Wolff , Julius Minding and Paul Heyse .
The guest venues of the Meininger
- German Empire : Berlin, Dresden , Leipzig , Gotha , Magdeburg , Frankfurt am Main , Mainz , Baden-Baden , Bremen , Barmen ( Wuppertal ), Hamburg , Cologne , Düsseldorf , Nuremberg , Munich , Koenigsberg , Stettin , Wroclaw , Strasbourg , Metz .
- Other European countries : Amsterdam , Rotterdam , Antwerp , Brussels , London , Basel , Trieste , Vienna , Graz , Budapest , Prague , Warsaw , St. Petersburg , Moscow , Kiev , Odessa , Copenhagen , Stockholm .
literature
- Meiningen's theater directorship towards the German Stage Association . According to official sources . Löffler, Meiningen 1879, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
- Hans Herrig : The Meiningen, their guest performances and their significance for the German theater . Grumbkow, Dresden 1879, Textarchiv - Internet Archive
- CWAllers : The Meininger . Friedrich-Conrad-Verlag, Leipzig approx. 1890.
- Karl Grube: The Meininger . Second thousand. Schuster & Loeffler, Berlin / Leipzig 1904, Textarchiv - Internet Archive .
- John Osborne (Ed.): Meininger. Texts on reception . Niemeyer, Tübingen 1980, ISBN 3-484-10384-1 , table of contents obvsg.at (PDF).
- Alfred Erck: History of the Meininger Theater. 1831-2006 . South Thuringian State Theater, Meiningen 2006.
- The Käthchen von Heilbronn at the Meininger Hoftheater. Exhibition by the Kleist Sembdner Archive of the City of Heilbronn together with the Meiningen State Museums from June 11 to 27, 1997 in the Sparkasse. [Edited on behalf of the city of Heilbronn. by Günther Emig]. Texts: Volker Kern. Heilbronn: Kleist-Archiv Sembdner 1997, ISBN 3-931060-28-4 , 98 pages (Kleist auf dem Theater, Volume 1).
- Kleist's Hermannsschlacht at the Meininger Hoftheater. Meiningen museums, theater museum, Meiningen cultural foundation, Kleist archive Sembdner Heilbronn, [30. September to October 27, 2002] / Kleist Archive Sembdner, Heilbronn. [Ed. by Günther Emig . Texts, photo selection: Volker Kern]. Heilbronn: Kleist Archive Sembdner 2002. 98 p. (Kleist on the Theater, Volume 2). ISBN 3-931060-58-6
- Günther Emig , Volker Kern (ed.): Kleist's "Prince Friedrich von Homburg" at the Meininger Hoftheater . [Texts: Volker Kern]. Kleist-Archiv Sembdner, Heilbronn 2011, ISBN 978-3-940494-46-7 , 84 pages (Kleist auf dem Theater, Volume 3).
- Staatliche Museen Meiningen : South Thuringian Research Issue 17 - Contributions to the town history of Meiningen . Meiningen 1982.
- The Meininger . In: The Gazebo . Issue 23, 1890, pp. 717-719 ( full text [ Wikisource ]).
