An exhibition at the Theatre Museum Düsseldorf (15.4.-23.9.2012)
In the end everyone is dead. Only Horatio is left with a mission – to tell Hamlet’s story… What is so fascinating about a four hundred year old tale of a son, doomed to take revenge for his father?
„The time is out of joint!” The play, which was released in 1601, marks a radical change in time. With the beginning of the new century the Elizabethean world is turning into modern time. In Hamlet Shakespeare verbalizes the conflict of the modern human being, which is ultimately a conflict of all of us: we know, that things are happening around us we cannot influence – and we cannot get rid of contradictions in our own life, even if we would like to…
For the first time in history a German museum tackles the Hamlet-topic and tells its history of reception on German stages over the last century. For this project Düsseldorf’s Theatre Museum has closely cooperated with the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, since its new director Staffan Valdemar Holm started the current season with his own interpretation of Hamlet. With especially created material, like filmed interviews with the actors, visitors of the exhibition will experience, how artistic decisions of present-day theatre experts are coming about.
The Hamlet Cosmos: Even people who have never been to a theatre do know Hamlet. Parts and pictures of its plot can be found all over in our every day life. German speaking readers and audiences are surrounded by numerous translations, which often are fashionable for some time and sometimes even form visual and listening habits for generations to come. With all these impressions the exhibition opens up a large field of questions and options.
Under the headline Family – Authority – Death the visitor is guided through the biographies of the main parts of the play. A game of chess with life size figures gives the opportunity to feel the conflict and the relations among the characters.
Great Soliloquies and Famous Actors. ‘Hamlet’ is the part all actors dream of and at the same time are frightened of. It holds an immense mass of lines and by this a wide range of ways to interpret the character. Inside a room-sized skull some acoustic examples make visitors take part in Hamlet’s thoughts and feelings.
Telling Stories: For the first time in 1926 director Rudolf Jessner used ‘Hamlet’ to reflect political developments of his own time. The casting of Fritz Kortner as Hamlet breaks with the romanticized traditions of Josef Kainz or Alexander Moissi. Almost a hundred years later, at the beginning of the 21th century the discovery of the “Generation Hamlet” refers to the mood of German post-middle-class-society. Insights into productions by Gustaf Gründgens, Karl-Heinz Stroux, Peter Zadek, Hans Günther Heyme, Jürgen Gosch, Volker Lösch or Oliver Reese will build up an idea, of how ‘Hamlet’ has been seen in 20th century Germany.
Space of Power: Staffan Valdemar Holm’s production is focussing on the breaking apart of two families in the centre of power. The stage design – three extremely high walls covered with gold form a vast doorless space – is telling from Elsinor, the wealthiest castle in Europe at Shakespeare’s time and is reflecting nowadays luxury. In this atmosphere of grandiosity and coldness the figures of the drama are thrown back on themselves. Another very important Shakespearean topic is getting visible: the power and helplessness of the theatre in its struggle for truth. In this sense, the first sentence of the drama – “Who’s there?” – is asking for identity. But – in the enduring alternation of hiding, lying and disguise any security is lost.
The exhibition is subsidised by the of State Government of North-Rhine-Westfalia and supported by SIGMA System Audio-Visuell GmbH
Co-operating Partners are: Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, Theaterwissenschaftliche Sammlung der Universität Köln (Cologne) , Deutsches Theatermuseum München (Munich), Stiftung Stadtmuseum Berlin and Österreichisches Theatermuseum Wien (Vienna).
Exhibition Information:
Opening hours: Tuesday – Sunday: 1:00 – 7:00 pm
Entrance Fee: 4,00 Euro,
Concession: 2,00 Euro, Under 18s are free
Guided Tours: every third Sunday at 3:30pm or can be booked by email: theatermuseum@stadt.duesseldorf.de
The extensive monthly programme can be found on the Museum’s webpage:
www.duesseldorf.de/theatermuseum/tm_aktuelles/tm_kalender
Text: Sibmas Newsletter, April 2012
