Emotional Snapshots

When Claus Peymann premiered Peter Handke's "Die Stunde da wir nichts voneinander wussten" in 1992, the ambition was to bring a timeless play to the stage. Short, almost lightning-like scenes were to illustrate what life is all about. However, this enormously ambitious claim was inherent neither in the text nor in Peymann's staging, so that directors such as Jürgen Gosch or Ene-Liis Semper and Tiit Ojasoo always made changes. The Berlin music theater formation Nico and the Navigators did not want to get involved in this at all, as director and ensemble leader Nicola Hümpel emphasizes: "Only the basic idea of letting people pass through a square comes from Peter Handke. For 'Die Stunde da wir zu viel voneinander wussten' we did our own research, observed bizarre micro-moments and lightning encounters, developed them further and enlarged them. There characteristic to abstract types of our time meet - with and without language, singing or mute." Psychologists emphasize the enormous potential that lies in the moment of an unbiased encounter, because people decide after just a few seconds whether their counterpart seems likeable to them. During the research on Berlin's Alexanderplatz, however, Hümpel was stunned to discover that these brief encounters hardly ever happen anymore: "Very few people meet each other because they don't pay attention to each other, but mostly communicate with their digital devices." The consequences of digitization affect perception and behavior: "I consider myself to have good intuition," Hümpel emphasizes. "Nevertheless, I have often had to revise my first impression. We live in an age in which people have learned very well how to pretend. The media have taught people to permanently work on their performance." Digital media, however, is just one of the various motifs and accessories that come into focus during stage encounters. "The diversity of the types portrayed is also reflected in the facets of the music," the director explains. "The compositions range from Franz Schubert to Benjamin Britten to Bonnie 'Prince' Billy." Whimsical observations of everyday life characterize this entertaining yet profound musical theater piece, which functions like a magnifying glass. If you see someone crying at the airport, you don't need to know if they've just said goodbye to their girlfriend or received a depressing phone call shortly before. Sometimes a gesture expressing compassion is enough to make the person crying not feel alone in the pain. "Empathy works even without prior contextual knowledge," Hümpel is certain.

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