Theater in Neubrandenburg: What was it like to be young after the fall of communism

Der Leipziger Domenico Müllensiefen ist ein Shooting-Star der Literatur. In Neubrandenburg kommt sein Erstling „In unseren Feuern“ auf die Bühne.

29. September 2024 um 17:00 UhrNeubrandenburg

This is the name of Domenico Müllensiefen’s first novel, which director Maik Priebe has now brought to the stage of the Neubrandenburg Theater. His production could play anywhere and yet it is right here and now.

The square of the floor around which the spectators sit on all sides is covered with a gray cloth, a city map. Whether the path shows the now or your wishes remains open. Young people, four men, two women, come here, all dressed in unison in shirts and trousers. They mark and stick places on the plan – and then Heiko talks about autumn 89, about Thomaskirchhof. But he is also the same, with a lunch box and a thermos bottle, at the hearse.

Nobody here has any hope

There they are close together, the hopes and the reality they have collided with. And just like his author Domenico Müllensiefen, Heiko (Erik Born) never says too many words, especially not big ones. Unless he’s running around with his buddies, they’re not really friends, that was just Thomas. He is now dead and accompanies Heiko and us throughout the entire piece.

The novelist and director, who also wrote the stage version of “In Our Fires,” nests and shifts the times between each other. When Thomas died, Heiko already called America, but we see the failed Karsten later.

“Schützenkönig” and “Collection Cup” represent the narrowness from which they can only escape as undertakers or at the REWE checkout. As laconic and warm-hearted as the book is, Maik Priebe has staged it on varying levels. Then Heiko’s mother (Danne Hoffmann) calmly brings her son to the sofa and at the same time worries about love and future angels. Later she brags as a stronger manager, dressed like that, and transforms back into her mother in front of the audience.

The friends move apart, all over the world

Six actors manage to bring more than 25 guys onto the stage, believably and at speed. Although the 1999 solar eclipse is a stopping point, it is always about friendship, love, growing up, finding a life where you are.

Although all of the friends have a “Carpe Diem” tattoo, they are increasingly growing apart. One of them dreams of internet funerals, while Heiko puts ten-year-old girls in coffins. Thomas (Robert Will), when he is still alive, entertains bomb fantasies that he christens “From Our Fires”. And Jana and Juliane (both played by Lisa Scheibner) are back and forth and finally away from Heiko.

On stage, things are fast-paced and sometimes rough, with videos accompanying or supplementing them. The stage also becomes a beach for Thomas and Heiko, and you can also wear overalls for your electrician apprenticeship there. One of the buddies falls more and more into “Reichsbürger” speaking and thinking. And finally the floor flaps become the coffin for Thomas, whose name the eulogist has to look up. And as in the novel, there are only a few location markers. But the play and its fate can be played anywhere.

topicnews · September 30, 2024

Theater in Neubrandenburg: What was it like to be young after the fall of communism – “In Our Fires” shows it

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