Photo: Rumle Skafte
Perhaps it is the translation by Madame Nielsen that saves the piece. Her language is glorious, found at the corner of the present, where fresh glosses bump into 200-year-old expressions on a walker. It's funny language, funny clashes. And precise.
- The restoration of my honor requires my total destruction.
- She speaks the language of power. Not her own language.
- Talk to us, instead of passing out all the time.
You can look forward to the text in 'Desolate'. I think. Furthermore, I am a great admirer of the direction, the stage, the costumes, lighting and sound. But you can see that for yourself.
The story is thief-stolen from 2 dead men
It is so eloquent, this year's graduation performance - the stage, the sound, the lighting, the direction, the actors - that you could consider buying an author as well. A person who can write her own stories. But instead, someone chose a box of chocolates from the Otto Duborg district.
Enis Maci.
The German woman has nicked half of the play from Heinrich von Kleist. It's easy enough. The man has been dead in the coffin for 200 years. He shot himself because of low self-esteem and no money. In order to gain courage, he first shot his new girlfriend (who also wanted to die), and then he could 'desolate' himself. It was popular back then, when you were poor and an artist.
It was thought that the great destruction - death - would restore man's honor. It must be something German. I don't understand.
The second half of the play, Enis Maci has ripped from Russ Meyer. He is also dead, but in the 60s he was a celebrated film director. In his films, all the female actors had large breasts. The Vixen, they were called. The film was always set in a desert. There was something about big cars and murders.
Russ Meyer's stories never made any sense, but we didn't care back then. Too busy with those breasts, and you yourself are 15 years old. And 35. And 45. And so on, and the glasses keep sliding down the nose.
Out of this cross-section the performance grows
It's good theatre, 'Desolate'. In the old days. A young woman is rescued by an officer from a brutal gang rape. He chases the fleeing gang. Kisses the young girl who has passed out. Kisses some more. Pulls up her skirt. And now it's happening. Perhaps the most famous rape scene in literature, written by Heinrich von Kleist. Here you get the scene in an English version: "Then— the officer." And in the German version: "Hier – traf er."
The line of thought - can you see it - it is the sign of a rape? Most German intellectuals think so. I don't know. It was easier to understand the imagery in Russ Meyer's stories, I think.
After she has been raped, the story is exciting. I couldn't sit still. The young girl - 200 years ago - lives in a culture where you don't get pregnant before marriage. So she gets a little harsh treatment, I'm sorry for that, because she doesn't even know she's been inseminated. She was passed out while it happened. Now she is judged unfairly because she has become pregnant.
Wild leap over steam engines, the Beatles and long hair
The story continues with an elegant jump, from Heinrich von Kleist's play 'Die Marquise von O's birth in 1808, across Denmark's bankruptcy, industrialization, the birth of communism, the world wars, the Beatles - right up to "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! ". The film by Russ Meyer from 1965. A film that takes place in a desert. All the women have big breasts, and so on. The film has been reviewed as "the world's worst film". That is, the lowest. Worst. But that is probably because the film reviewers then sat in the cinema hall and could not enjoy themselves with the essentials of the movie.
In the new era, with the violent Vixen women, it is the men who go on the defensive. The women have the power. A nice contrast to the old days.
Our female protagonist - now super pregnant - is fighting for her life. Restoring her honor, and clinging to her unborn child. Fighting is a better restoration of honor, I think. Kleist may disagree, in his cold and wet grave.
The moral in 'Desolate' - and 5 stars
Over time, the victims change faces. But the bad people are the same. Namely, those who were harmed. And then they take revenge and kill people without really having any reason. No reason other than evil.
See it for yourself. Or no, together with other audience members at Aarhus Theatre. A fine graduation performance at a 5 stars-rating. Thanks.
Desolate by Enis Maci (Heinrich von Kleist, Russ Meyer)
Cast Students at DDSKS, Drama Aarhus: Ask Bernsen, Emil Knutzon, Ida Mia Appel, Marie Boda, Mia Lindgreen, Minna Flyvholm Tode, Oscar Salvatore
Staging Nina Rudawski
Choreography Ossi Niskala
Scenography & Costume Design Anna Dolata
Light Mathilde Niemann Hyttel
Composer and sound Mihael Buchardt Steffensen
Translation Madame Nielsen
Presented by Den Danske Scenekunstskole.
Ambiorn Happy, Kulturnyt.net
★★★★★★
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