DR. FAUSTUS LIGHTS THE LIGHTS (2016)
Music theatre after Gertrude Stein for 5 actors* making music and interludes
Duration: 70 min.
|
Direction/Dramaturgy |
REMSI AL KHALISI & ENSEMBLE BASED ON A CONCEPT BY CHRISTOPH HETZENECKER |
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music by |
IRIS TER SCHIPHORST |
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Stage and costumes |
LENA KALT |
Performers: Stefan Hartmann, Pina Kühr, Katharina Brenner, Marie Nest, Alexander Tröger
Performance material available from the composer
Gertrude Stein's "Dr Faustus". Faustian light
Deutschlandfunk | Thomas Senne | 21.06.2016
https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/gertrude-steins-dr-faustus-faustisches-licht-100.html
Program Note:
Doctor Faustus invented light - almost. It was the electric light. Since then it's been BRIGHT IN THE DARK, EVEN TOO BRIGHT. He could almost have done it on his own if he'd had the peace and quiet he didn't have. He had the devil whisper the solution to him, and since then Doctor Faustus has been resting, in debt for his soul, in one, his bath of light. But it is more like a fountain, with forests sprouting between its splashes that can poison a single woman: "Marguerite Ida and Helena Annabel". She seeks help from the doctor to escape the poison and finds something. For example, a disappointed scholar who finds his lonely fate of not being able to go to hell or anywhere else without a soul rather hard to cope with - or his companions, an eternally grateful dog and a boy who is loyal to him. They are more happy than depressed to be able to leave this story for once. For it turns out to be an unusually unstable structure.
With her dazzling work, Gertrude Stein created authoritative texts that paved the way for literary modernism and revolutionised writing and language, including that of the theatre. Originally planned as a libretto for an opera, her version of the classic Faust myth has itself become language music.
Reviews
Reviewer's son
"Originally conceived by Gertrude Stein as a libretto for the opera, the play is based both on Stein's unmistakable word acrobatics and on the music composed by Iris ter Schiphorst, combining the two to create an extraordinary synthesis of the arts.
Dr Faustus lights the lights is fun, is the epitome of modern theatre and confuses at the highest level. The convincingly exalted behaviour of the performers makes it impossible for the audience to escape the colourful whirl on stage."
Franconian Day
"Stefan Hartmann plays a sometimes mischievous Faust who ironises his own character. (...) Katharina Brenner is convincing as the initially amusing, then increasingly (...) desperate Mephisto. (...) The fast-paced production of Stein's colourful play, carefully orchestrated by director Remsi Al Khalisi, is carried by the sometimes contrasting, sometimes religiously grounded music by composer Iris ter Schiphorst."