Even before the ceiling light goes out, birdsong can be heard, transporting you to a place far away from the theater. Dry leaves lie in the corner, wooden sticks hang from the ceiling. They are reminiscent of trees in a forest, only reduced and the wrong way round. Just like the backdrop of the stage, the stories of “Letters to Trees and Clouds” unfold – everything is twisted, abstract, turned upside down. One absurd short scene follows the next. Markus Beisl, Denis Fink, Doris Länglacher and Anja Neukamm switch between a wide variety of characters, exaggerated in their peculiarities, caught in bizarre mind games.
The first official act of the four characters on stage: put on work gloves. These are necessary because wood is handled a lot. The four of them create sounds with the material in every imaginable way, which interweave with the live sound art of Ardhi Engel, who, in addition to the guitar, has gathered numerous extravagant instruments around him. Wooden boards, logs and trunks interact and are rearranged in the spirit of “physical theater”, as is the world order and constellations of the characters.
A man wakes up one day and realizes that he is empty. An abandoned piano causes turmoil and megalomania in a village. A disease is spreading: words are now deadly. On the S-Bahn to Pasing – location of the “Much Ado About Nothing” theater – passengers drop dead because they say “main route closure”. The same goes for the “meal” that is often used in this country. An impressive parody of German culture.
The piece combines these and other strange situations with monologues from a student who ponders the world in a naive, childlike way. In letters to his woodsy friend outside the classroom window, the boy wonders: “Why did they have to kill trees so I could write letters to trees?” His fear that this tree would also become “paper pulp” would later come true. A new fear arises for the clouds and therefore for people’s dreams.
With his text collage, the Romanian playwright Matéï Visniec takes the audience into absurd visions that seem to have arisen from children’s imaginations and function far removed from common thought patterns. The characters move naively through the world that is threatened with extinction and, despite all their efforts, seem to fail because of their circumstances. Between the scenes there is space to think about questions about the destruction of nature, social isolation and capitalism – and for hope.
With the German premiere of “Letters to Trees and Clouds,” director Arno Friedrich reminds us to take time to dream and go through life less tensely, even when it is cruel.
“Letters to Trees and Clouds”, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, 8 p.m., until January 20, 2024, Theater Much Ado About Nothing, Pasinger Fabrik, August-Exter-Straße 1, www.theaterviellaermumnichts.de