Artists host artists and chat with what was and what is. A format almost as old as television, but definitely viable on the Internet as well. So why, after all the others, does AltesKino.TV also use this standard? Because it can. The test preview on Friday evening shows that “Hans Klaffl and guest: It’s good that we talked about it!” is of its own size – even if at this early stage sticking to the schedule and the prepared questions still seems a bit strained. Precisely because Klaffl is a rampage pig like out of a picture book, he almost only alludes to the audience in the hall and saves himself the pseudo-confidential ingratiation to those who sit “outside at the umbrellas”. His guest Josef Brustmann, free from the liver and powerful in dialect, apparently fits in perfectly with the stuff – the stage is alive.
Klaffl would be unfaithful to himself if his opener wasn’t in the world of School & us played. One can safely assume that his cabaret-style preparation of the more or less 13 years between geography book, gym bag and sandwich is the greatest addiction factor for most visitors. With fine points and coarse strokes, Klaffl gets to the bottom of the question why teachers were not scared by the pandemic, but on the contrary were almost able to enjoy them. “Dealing with contradicting numbers and chaotic instructions from politics – the unsuccessful attempt to convert the grammar school from G 9 to G 8 made a lasting impression on us,” he noted and received knowledgeable applause from an apparently co-affected audience.
For a while, a large screen next to the curtain shows what viewers are being served in the online stream. This is especially exciting for those present in the back rows, who occasionally hear the muttered announcements from the director. When, for example, Brustmann lies down on the psycho-couch from the therapist Klaffl for analysis, the TV picture changes perspective again and again: face, upper body, counter-cut to the questioner. For the presence audience, on the other hand, nothing visually changes. Depending on the placement in the hall: shoe soles, suit, nostrils. The person asked is only a voice. That certainly has its charm – but mainly because of the comparison. Otherwise this dive takes a little too long. Maybe a mirror will help in the future?
Otherwise, live clearly has the upper hand over streaming. What the Internet viewers miss is the banter between the two cabaret artists after the broadcast has closed. Things get down to business a whole dimension more relaxed and relaxed, freed from the tight schedule. Above all, however, it is the pieces for which Brustmann then sits down at the zither again, a reward for the fact that guests set out and honored the artists with their presence. If the version of the Beatles number “Across the Universe” cut straight into the air is already a galactic crossover experience, the journey to the ADAC classic (Brustmann fans know the story, the others chuckle audibly) turns into the “Highway to Hell” “of heavenly goodness. The final two and a half minutes of “Amazing Grace” with thrown travel alphorn were finally worth the whole Friday evening.
About what potential “It’s good we talked about it!” that becomes clear during a short but intense cross-country ride through the linguistic landscape. Brustmann reports that as a child of displaced people, he was initially nowhere linguistically at home due to the dialect of a mixed marriage, but then acquired the dialect of the new homeland through his older siblings and with pointed ears in a quality that he today has means and tools is to express yourself artistically. “How colorful and colorful the dialect is, how it cuts and abbreviates” he agrees with Klaffl and for a few precious minutes you feel like a silent witness to a familiar conversation between friends. That shines just as temptingly as the anecdotal gold piece from the sales talk for the Brustmann concert grand piano, on which Wagner and Liszt have already played, but whose saleswoman had rather practical concerns about parting with the good piece: “Then where do I put my crib?”
To put it in school grades: This debut was already a good threesome. Subject understood, properly implemented, occasional surprises, but with room for improvement. According to the old translation motto “as literal as necessary, as free as possible”, Klaffl will improve significantly if he brings the skills he demonstrated earlier into play, gives more space to improvisation and blurs the impression that everything has already been agreed . So let’s look at the next episodes, the format and other guests from the class of Josef Brustmann deserve it.