The music theatre piece "Heimat im Koffer" tells the stories of artists who fled abroad to escape National Socialism. University students spent months developing the play themselves. A look behind the scenes.
Saturday, 29 June: It's premiere night. The students have been working towards this evening for months. The whispering of the audience drifts through the auditorium. Then fog rises from the stage and creeps through the rows of chairs. The lights go out. And a voice echoes through the room from the entrance to the auditorium. Showtime.
A look back: Rehearsal weekend, 14 days before the premiere. Volker Schindel has taken off his shoes. He slides across the wooden floor of the auditorium towards the edge of the stage wearing only brown socks. All the performers and musicians rehearse for three days, with the first full rehearsal at the end. For this time, the auditorium is Schindel's living room. No audience members are sitting on the chairs yet, just the performers' bags. Schindel, artistic assistant for "Music, Scene, Theatre", repeatedly jumps up from his seat in the front row and gives the students on stage suggestions for improvement.
"Heimat im Koffer" is a co-operation project between Schindel, musicologist Dr Anna Langenbruch and Arne Wachtmann, research assistant on the "Integrated Media" Master's degree course. The music theatre piece is part of the Master's degree in the subject of music. Langenbruch, who led the academic part of the project, spent three days researching the German Exile Archive in Frankfurt am Main with students in preparation for the play. Her colleague Myrin Sumner, who is herself involved in the play, later analysed the material. She worked through around 300 documents and letters. "We looked at the estates of selected artists and considered what would be suitable for staging a theatre play," she explains.
Burning books on the organ
The music students then set poems to music themselves, composed pieces and rearranged most of the works used. The students on the Integrated Media master's programme are responsible for the sound and projections. For the rehearsals, they are assigned to individual scenes in small groups, and the rehearsal weekend is also the first time that projection, actors and stage come together for them. The atmosphere in the auditorium is relaxed but focussed. At the entrance, students are working on the costumes, while the actors are already rehearsing on stage.
Among them is Dani Hacke. She plays the journalist Robert Breuer and is rehearsing a scene about the book burning. The characters sleep in a hostel, burning books are projected onto the organ in the background. Dani twitches in her sleep, startles and reaches for her diary. Schindel interrupts briefly, the two speak quietly to each other. From the beginning again. Dani's sleep becomes more restless this time and her cries echo loudly in the empty auditorium. Schindel nods contentedly. On to the rehearsal catalogue.
Demanding stage work
"I'm mainly nervous about the last scene, because that's Breuer's longest poem," Dani reveals later. When she recites it at home, it's very different from in front of an audience. "Fortunately, Volker is there to help a lot with the expression."
Each of the participants takes on several roles. Dani also plays guitar, marimba and percussion, Myrin acts. Rosa Dunkelgut is also involved - she is not only on stage, but also takes care of the set design for the musical theatre piece together with other students. They have spent a good 15 hours on the costumes alone so far. "We needed a certain historicity," explains Rosa. "Sometimes, for example, a certain colour didn't fit, which is why we had to sort a lot of things out." Many of the pieces came from second-hand shops or grandparents' wardrobes. There is still some alteration work to be done before the premiere. "You always need safety pins here," smiles Rosa.
"We rehearse wherever we can."
Langenbruch's group started their research last October and the first rehearsals began in February. Nevertheless, Rosa is not the only one who still has a lot of work to do. The run-through rehearsal alone ultimately takes five hours. "We didn't yet know who would dismantle what and what would have to be built up. The transitions between the scenes were also still really difficult," says Myrin, laughing timidly. "In the next two weeks, we have to make everything even more compact. We're now rehearsing where we can."
Back on opening night. An actress walks down the centre aisle. As soon as she enters the stage, the war begins. Sirens mingle with drums and percussion, people run across the stage with their suitcases, desperately seeking shelter. The suitcases are used as props throughout the play: they serve as chairs and tables and metaphors for the few belongings that the artists took with them into exile. Pianist Jascha Nemtsov, otherwise Professor of the History of Jewish Music at the Weimar University of Music, appears as a surprise guest in a concert scene. He interprets works by Jewish composers - a production within a production. At the end, Dani enters the stage for the final scene. Behind her, the suitcases rise into the air as if by magic, all the performers sing quietly in chorus. She takes a deep breath and starts. Her monologue is spot on. Rosa's costumes have also held up. As they all take a final bow on stage to thunderous applause, pride and relief are written all over their faces.
