Festival criticism

When civilization lies in ruins

Hero on his deathbed: finale in a game of associations(Bild: © Salzburger Festspiele/Sandra Then)

The Salzburg Festival co-produces Stefan Zweig's "Sternstunden" with the Munich Residenztheater at the Salzburg Landestheater. Conclusion: a successful venture!

Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) shines a light into our threatened era less as a brilliant writer than as a person and biography. A humanist and cosmopolitan with an unprecedented history of emigration:

A sheltered literary star, he killed himself in exile in Brazil because his culture had been taken away from him along with the breath of life. His collection "Sternstunden der Menschheit" describes 14 moments that changed the course of history through triumph or failure.

Barbara Melzl, Evelyne Gugolz, Steffen Höld(Bild: © Salzburger Festspiele/Sandra Then)

Nicola Mastroberadino, Vincent Glander, Isabell Antonia Höckel, Barbara Melzl, Evelyne Gugolz(Bild: © Salzburger Festspiele/Sandra Then)

And what stands next to each other on an equal footing: Napoleon before Waterloo, the Gold Rush, the failure of the world community in Versailles in 1919 - but also the emergence of the "Marienbad Elegy" from an erotic obsession of old Goethe. Director Thom Luz creates an exciting performative structure from this, an anarchic score of words and images, association and text, rhythm and movement. The darkness is filled with the man-sized debris of lost civilizations. The performers seek out individual megaliths and enter into a dialog with them. Scenes take shape. Zweig's tragedy, from the harassment and expulsion to the final act in Petrópolis, is documented with sharpness and urgency.

In contrast, the testimonies of history rush by as if fragments of memory were racing through the dying man's head. The six actors and the apocalyptic cemetery band are to be admired.