Sound design and music for Bram Jansen’s take on a Schnitzler classic at Theater Oberhausen.
Theater Oberhausen
About
A strange mixture of passion, melancholy, chauvinism and irony permeates Schnitzler’s one-act cycle Anatol: The poet and dandy Anatol allows himself to be driven from one affair to another. His erotic adventures take him through all levels of society. Anatol lives completely in the moment, cheats on his lovers and at the same time on himself, transfiguring his dalliances into great love each time and yet already suspecting the end. His analytical friend Max comments on Anatol’s affairs and self-deceptions: sometimes compassionately, sometimes ironically, and, if necessary, supports him against the women. What does Anatol hope to find in his restless search for new love adventures – love or adventure? Is he, as he says of himself: a “reckless melancholic” looking for “immortal hours”? Or rather a womanizer controlled by his instincts? What’s up with friend Max? And what do women feel, think and want…?
Anatol is a sparkling comedy of half-feelings. If you read Arthur Schnitzler’s diary entries and love letters from the time it was written, the autobiographical nature of the scenes is obvious. But Schnitzler splits his personality into the “hypochondriac of his feelings” Anatol and the astute, cynical commentator Max. And unlike his private behavior towards his lovers, Schnitzler grants his female characters triumphs in the battle of the sexes. His title hero, on the other hand, despite all the situational comedy and wordplay, always makes us shudder at his deep loneliness, his inability to have real emotions and his inner emptiness.
The exciting and impressive Dutch theater scene is right on our doorstep. Every June, the Amsterdam ITs Festival presents the graduates of theater schools from Amsterdam and Maastricht. In 2012, the funny and clever Strindberg adaptation Kijken naar Julie by a 24-year-old directing graduate from the Toneel-academie Maastricht thrilled the festival audience: Bram Jansen’s graduation production is in 2013 at the European young talent festivals “Premières” in Karlsruhe and “Fast Forward” in Braunschweig as well as at festivals in St. Petersburg and Timisoara (Romania). Bram Jansen is now directing Arthur Schnitzler’s early work Anatol at the Theater Oberhausen – his first directorial work in Germany.
Credits
Text: Arthur Schnitzler
With: Angela Falkenhan (die Frau), Konstantin Buchholz (Anatol), Peter Waros (Max)
Direction: Bram Jansen
Scenography: Guus van Geffen
Costume design: Nadja Turlings
Sound design & music: Jorg Schellekens
Dramaturgy: Rüdiger Bering
Assistent director and stage manager: Laura Kreutzenbeck
Assistent scenography: Maria Eberhardt
Assistent costumed design: Joana Ganser, Ines Koehler
Thanks to: Ryan Djojokarso
Première
7 February 2014, Malersaal, Theater Oberhausen (Oberhausen, DE)