Linkerhand

Moriz Eggert

Cast

Announcements

Moritz Eggert – Blog Moritz Eggert

Ritschel is no Neuenfels, Castorf, Guth (yet) – and in some respects this is good. He does not have to liveup to certain expectations, to satisfy critics or to celebrate a “style”. He is close to the topic, he tries to make a good job of it, to make it “his”– without conceitedness, in spite of adverse circumstances, never “against” the play, pragmatically but lovingly. That is a major achievement and he does his job very, very well.

A young team of singers and actors contributed to his play – all of them in a marvellous way – also the choir. It would be a sin to highlight single names (you can look them up) because what is required here is teamwork.

Reviews

MDR Sachsen – MDR

Successful debut performance of the opera “Linkerhand”…

On Sunday, the sold out debut performance of the opera “Linkerhand” in the “Lausitzhalle” was celebrated by the audience with standing ovations. At the end of the 44th Music Festival the ensemble of the Görlitz theatre - based on the novel “Franziska Linkerhand” written by Brigitte Reimann – has recalled the woman, who built a literary memorial for the town with her novel, to the inhabitants` mind...

The staging led by Sebastian Ritschel and composed by Moritz Eggert was rewarded by the inhabitants of Hoyerswerda with long applause and standing ovations.

Boris Michael Gruhl - MDR FIGARO

“Franziska Linkerhand” as successful music theatre!

I would describe the staging as very successful. The power of this staging lies in its simplicity and it all happening very clearly. The stage director guides the audience through the … story without using any bells and whistles. The stage is actually empty, it is the combination of music, the story and emotions which creates enough images from the connotations. Only fallen down prefabricated apartment blocks lie – like dashed and broken hope – for people to move across.

Michael Laages – Deutschlandradio

But above all the staging of “Linkerhand” by Sebastian Ritschel highlights continually (and often in an impressive way) the conflict between the single person and the masses. The masses has simple wishes: baking on Saturdays, barbequing on Sundays and on Mondays going to the “Schwarze Pumpe” again. And if somebody (man or woman) marches to a different drummer and deviates from the norm and the aim, the collective can become beastly, even musically.

Boris Michael Gruhl – DNN

Based on the novel – composed by Moritz Eggert with the text written by Andrea Heuser, the Görlitz theatre has premiered the opera “Linkerhand” in the sold-out “Lausitzhalle”. The audience experienced vigorous, touching as well as entertaining music theatre, which first of all captivates by the various musical forms, skilfully joined together by the composer…

Theatrically it was a great success. The vigour of the staging by Sebastian Ritschel lies in the simplicity, in the clarity of guiding the people and in the coherence of the images. In actual fact, the stage by Karen Hilde Fries is empty – fallen down prefabricated apartment blocks and dashed hopes create a treacherous foundation, on which at the end, little apartment blocks are positioned, softly illuminated as if they are picturesque toys …

The poetry of the soft sounds does not come off badly. The historical connection and topicality of the work is more emotional, as the people are treated with dignity. Their great yearning, compared to their limited possibilities, are placed in the light – but not exposed–increased musically.

Jens Daniel Schubert - Sächsische Zeitung

Gripping emotions between prefabricated apartment blocks…

With clear pictures, stylized, often choreographed movements and a plain, uniform stage setting (set by Karen Hilde Fries) it aims at the inner sensitivities, foregoes avtivism and reflection of the reality. This is calmingly unexciting – even the dismal grey sadness and the uniformed exorbitant presentation of social behaviour is never derogatory and offensive.

Maybe it was also the relaxing effect that the authors as well as the staging team provide an external prospective, do not work like slaves on their own specific story, but search for the meanings while looking at the specific historical and local connection. In this respect, the interesting and complex work had outstanding surroundings for its first performance for its successful realization in the “Lausitzhalle” in Hoyerswerda – but it is also at the right place in the Görlitz theatre and elsewhere.

Wolfgang Schreiber – Süddeutsche

Passion of the wild life

The tension of a fight between “individuality and vision on the one hand and myth and collective art on the other hand” is performed in scenes. Towards the end of the opera the eponymous heroine insists with a sweeping aria on her maxim “Life – I want to live!”…

There is a scenic rhythm making the audience instantly go for it – right up until the cheeky final song with the pop singer Django. The stage actions equipped by Karen Hilde Fries are colourful and in constant movement; the director Sebastian Ritschel supports them with the ensemble and its enormous passion to play.

Andreas Hilger - Mitteldeutsche Zeitung

Stage director Sebastian Ritschel and set decorator Karen Hilde Fries find meaningful counterparts for the short scenes. There are signs floating from the stage sky, which comment and caricature the events. The tricky and jointed chorus sentences are used for parades. And there are the giants of progress standing as empty buildings in the middle of their dwarfish planned town, in which even the sky-scrapers are too small to house the yearning of Brigitte Reimann and her character Franziska Linkerhand.

Thomas Rothschild - Financial Times

Anything but provincial.

The opera “Linkerhand” is as a creation as well as in its production by the young and throughout delighting Görlitz ensemble a perfect example for up-to-date music theatre.

Prof. Dr. Franz R. Stuke – Opernnetz

Sebastian Ritschel stages differentiated depending on each individual situation, emphasizing Franziska’s ability to suffer, characterizing the antagonistic characters in their dramatic constellations – while leaving space for collective reactions and individual feelings.

Thomas Rothschild – Kulturgemeinschaft

The stylization chosen by the stage director Sebastian Ritschel focuses more on choreography (created by Dan Pelleg and Marko E. Weigert) than on “realistic music theatre” in the style of Felsenstein. Thus the excellent choir does not only play an important role for the music but also for the stage. Constantly forming new groupings it moves around in the scenery - a cubic landscape built of prefabricated buildings laid flat – designed by Karen Hilde Fries.