Nobody (Horváth)
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| Title: | Nobody |
| Genus: | Tragedy in seven pictures |
| Original language: | German |
| Author: | Ödön from Horváth |
| Publishing year: | 1924 |
| Premiere: | September 1, 2016 |
| Place of premiere: | Theater in the Josefstadt |
| Place and time of the action: | Apartment building in a big city |
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The tragedy Nobody is an early work by the writer Ödön von Horváth . After Horváth had completed it in 1924, the manuscript was considered lost for almost a century until it was rediscovered in 2015. The world premiere of Nobody took place at the Wiener Theater in der Josefstadt in 2016 , 92 years after Horváth had submitted the play to the Berliner Verlag . The eponymous Nobody is quoted several times by the protagonists of the play in the course of the plot and made responsible for their respective life situations. Residents meet in the stairwell of an apartment building, penniless artists, prostitutes and employees. The owner of the apartment building, Lehmann, is a tyrant to them. When Lehmann gets married, it seems to everyone that the precarious living and living conditions of the time may change for the protagonists.
action
Fürchtegott Lehmann is the owner of an apartment building and has suffered from a walking disability since childhood, which prevents him from leaving the house. The tenants of the house include the musician Klein, who can no longer pay his rent, the prostitute Gilda, who is under constant control of her pimp Wladimir, and the starving and destitute Ursula, who is taken under the wing of Gilda. Lehmann and Ursula meet and soon get married. Lehmann takes his feelings of happiness as an opportunity to be less tyrannical with his tenants. Among other things, he postpones the immediate expulsion of the musician Klein from his apartment by offering him the opportunity to play wedding music for a fee.
Contrary to what had been hoped, however, things are not developing for the better, but are triggering new crises. In anger over the bruised mine, pimp Vladimir kills one of Gilda's customers. He will be arrested. Lehmann and Ursula already become estranged on their wedding night: he suspects that she married him out of pity and own need. To make matters worse, Fürchtegott's older brother Kaspar Lehmann suddenly appears, who not only starts an affair with Ursula, but also confronts the younger brother with his trauma.
Performance history
Horváth was only 23 years old when he wrote Nobody . Although he submitted the manuscript to the Berliner Verlag, initially no theater wanted to perform the play. The publisher went bankrupt a short time later and the piece could not be found until it was identified as Horváth's work at an auction in 2015. This was the second auction after the manuscript had changed to a private owner in the 1990s.
After its reappearance, a competition was organized for the premiere of the play, which ended in 2016 with the premiere at the Theater in der Josefstadt, directed by Herbert Föttinger , who is also the director of the theater. An ensemble of 24 people was used for the faithful implementation of the original text. In the premiere, the roles were cast as follows: Dominic Oley (Klein), Martina Stilp (Gilda), Gerti Drassl (Ursula), Martin Zauner , Wojo van Brouwer , Gregor Kronthaler , Patrick Seletzky (men in black), Elfriede Schüsseleder (caretaker ), André Pohl (pastry chef), Florian Teichtmeister (Fürchtegott Lehmann), Roman Schmelzer (Wladimir), Peter Scholz (painter), Thomas Kamper (glazier), Alexander Strobele (carpenter), Swintha Gersthofer (waitress), Saša Savić (the great Landlord), Josephine Bloéb (The Successor), Raphael von Bargen (Stranger), Christian Futterknecht (Uralter Stutzer), Oliver Huether (First Detective), Alexander Absenger (Second Detective), Antonia Jung (Backfisch), Marianne Nentwich (Ancient Virgin) , Oliver Rosskopf (drunk). Birgit Hutter was responsible for the costumes, Ulrike Zemme was the dramaturge .
Further performances took place from December 3, 2016 at the Landestheater Linz . From March 25, 2017, Nobody was performed under the direction of Dušan David Pařízek at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin . For the implementation, Pařízek limited himself to seven actors, who in places handle the text freely and summarize dialogues and scenes from other protagonists. Texts from later Horváth works are also interwoven with comments and monologized by the characters.
Martina Stilp as Gilda and Roman Schmelzer as Wladimir in the world premiere
Florian Teichtmeister as Fürchtegott Lehmann in the world premiere
Part of the set at the premiere
Rating
The reviews after the premiere in Vienna were muted. Nobody is interpreted, among other things, as the author's ambitious early work, in which Horváth has not yet found the stylistic security of his later socially critical works.
Web links
- Nobody on the website of the theater in der Josefstadt
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d www.spiegel.de , When the poet was still practicing. , Spiegel Online, accessed January 6, 2018.
- ↑ a b c www.faz.net , Our innermost? Not a pretty sight , Frankfurter Allgemeine, accessed January 6, 2018.
- ↑ a b wien.orf.at , Verschollenes Horvath play premiered , ORF website, accessed on January 6, 2018.
- ^ Theater in der Josefstadt: Nobody . Retrieved January 7, 2018.
- ^ Landestheater Linz: Nobody . Retrieved January 7, 2018.
- ^ Deutsches Theater Berlin - Nobody, tragedy in seven pictures by Ödön von Horváth . Retrieved January 7, 2018.
- ↑ www.kulturradio.de ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Nobody , Kulturradio, accessed January 6, 2018.
