Montoliu-Kostüm/Bühne

Zärtlichkeit der Russen

Stage director: Sandra Strunz December 2011 Photo David Baltzer

Die Zärtlichkeit der Russen

From the life of a war generation.
By Dagrun Hintze

“The others, that's a fact, they had a childhood. But I can't be one hundred per cent sure about that,' says a woman in Die Zärtlichkeit der Russen (The Tenderness of the Russians) by Dagrun Hintze. The playwright spent over a year conducting interviews with residents of a retirement and nursing home. The result is a play in which nine people talk about their lives. Or rather, they attempt to recount their stories. Memory gaps, feelings of guilt, and traumatic war experiences make it difficult for them to make sense of their own stories. The Second World War shaped all of the characters in their younger years. Mrs H lost her husband; Mrs K remembers chocolate above all else, and mentions in passing that her father shot himself at her mother's grave in 1945. Mr Z lost an arm in the war and laments the harshness of his fate above all else: divorce, estrangement from his children, alcoholism and debt. He has no fond memories. ‘And if I did, then I've forgotten them.’ Nevertheless, this historical document tenderly examines the narrators, without leaving anything out. This sometimes leads to brutal humour. For example, Mrs W tells her daughter, 'Someone asked me the other day if I had a nice childhood. I did, didn't I?' Her daughter replies: ‘No, but if you say so.’

Stage Director: Sandra Strunz
Dramaturgy: Beret Evensen
Stage design: Judith Kästner
Costume design: Belén Montoliu
Composer: Michael Emanuel Bauer
Lighting: Andreas Rösler

World Premiere December 2011