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The Tobacconist

based on Robert Seethalers novel / Stage version by Marcel Kohler

Theatre
Alter Saal
in German
[recommended for ages 15 and up]

Young Franz Huchel has to leave his home village by the Attersee lake to work in Vienna as an apprentice in a tobacconist's - a small tobacco and newspaper shop. It is late summer in 1937 and the new impressions overwhelm the 17-year-old: The big city that is noisy and stinks (or are these the rotten times?), the new job at the tobacconist's (a temple of relish?), the growing friendship with regular customer Sigmund Freud (the famous Sigmund Freud?!), first love (that overwhelming, immortal, overpowering, unfulfilled love - or is that libido, Mr. Freud?) and his dreams (which haunt Franz, like uninvited guests). The shocks of growing up collide with the political shocks of the world. Franz wonders: »Have I gone mad? Or has the world gone mad?«

After the great success of his production »The Tale of the Little Mermaid«, director Marcel Kohler is working for the second time at the Theater und Orchester Heidelberg. His stage version of the best-selling novel supplements the text with documentary material, an exchange of letters between Sigmund Freud and Albert Einstein and song lyrics by the band Wanda.


Content notes / Notes on sensitive content

Direction
Stage and Costumes
Video
Linn Reusse
Videodreh
Lea Fröhlich Hanna Green Elisa Svensson Barnaby Vardigans Tom Wernecke
Dramaturgy
Theatre Education
Mareike Schneider
Franz Huchel
Margarete Huchel / Heinzi
Otto Trsnjek / Alois Preininger / Pfarrer
Sigmund Freud / Conférencier
Music recordings
Ondes Martenot
Friedrich Paravicini
Drums
Hanno Stick
Statisterie im Video
Paul Berg Malte Borgfeldt
Assistant Director
Paul Berg, Klaudia Rzeźniczak (Preliminary rehearsals) / Therese von Aretin
Soufflage/ Einstein
Henner John
Assistant Stage Design
Judith Grätzer
Collaboration Costumes
Sophie Tautorus (Preliminary rehearsals) / Anne Schartmann
Dramaturgy Hospitanz
Tamara Weber 

The production of the decorative parts is carried out in the workshops of the Theater und Orchester Heidelberg.

A complete list of all employees of the technical departments involved can be found here.

Listen to an introduction in German by Ida Feldmann here.

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Trailer by Siegerbuschfilm

»Dieser Abend inspiriert, er belebt, er erweitert den Horizont. Und er unterhält«, so Volker Oesterreich in der Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung (2. Oktober 2023). Marcel Kohlers Textfassung verschaffe dem Abend eine »beachtliche Vieldimensionalität«, Kohler sprudele aber auch als Regisseur »nur so vor abwechslungsreichen Ideen«, ohne das Hauptmotiv des Romans aus dem Blick zu verlieren. »Überzeugend« findet der Rezensent auch die Darsteller*innen, die detailreiche Ausstattung und den Einsatz von Musik: »Jede Menge Pluspunkte also für den ›Trafikanten‹ im Alten Saal.« 

Marcel Kohler entwerfe in seiner Inszenierung »ein originelles Spiel« mit dem zeitgeschichtlichen Sujet, bemerkt Eckhard Britsch im Mannheimer Morgen (2. Oktober 2023), »satirische Szenen« wechselten sich hier ab mit »bitterem Ernst«. Dabei werde in »plastischer Figurenzeichnung ausgezeichnet« gespielt, dem Premierenpublikum habe es ebenso »ausgezeichnet« gefallen.