The Wiener Volkstheater won this year's Nestroy Theater Prize – best German-language performance, best director: Claudia Bauer, best actor: Samouil Stoyanov and also best supporting role: Elias Eilinghoff.
Admittedly, the nominations had been known for some time, and director Kay Voges apparently thought of a fun production about theater awards in general.
So, along with Gunnar Klack, Kristof Magnusson wrote “Apocalypse MEOW.
A comedy of the end of the world”, which has now celebrated its premiere under the direction of Voges.
You can see immediately that a lot of effort was invested to make the piece as suitable as possible for Vienna.
So the “Nestroy Prize” became the “Destroy Prize”, i.e. a kind of destruction award, which fits back into the theme of the end of the world and even mumbling underlines Vienna’s reputation as a city with a special connection to death.
In the stage set designed by Michael Sieberock-Serafimowitsch, in the background, a huge panoramic window looks out over a Vienna that is probably set in the near future, where creepy high-rise buildings built by the usual suspicious sponsors spoil the scenery.
Incidentally, court proceedings are currently under way in Vienna regarding such development plans.
While the award ceremony in front of the curtain is being moderated by Bonnie van Klompp, in which the role of Evi Kehrstephan is admirably light-footed and then constantly switching between a Dutch accent and High German in the lounge, the audience can see what is behind the scenes, so to speak, in that very room the lounge that fills the stage and has a panoramic window.
Remarkable effort
There chat, argue, show solidarity, beg each other in various categories that it is a real pleasure.
For example, the old fox director Wenjamin Olinde with his former assistant director Meta Gleiberg.
Mona Ulrich, who is responsible for the costumes, put Andreas Beck in a dark suit with a bright red scarf, which is strikingly reminiscent of Paulus Manker's public appearances.
The Gleiberg is given by Anke Zillich in a white suit decorated with pseudo-cheerful black caricatures, philosophizing a lot about missed opportunities for "feminist protest" or sexist behavior of all men.
And so it continues.
A total of eight characters and two Teletubbies constantly reproach each other that evening, but of course they are all only meant to be supportive, as usual.
Until the asteroid hits.
Then there's a break, and after that it gets really confusing.
The effort here is also remarkable - the lounge is now a field of rubble, the ensemble is in rather dirty, destroyed clothes.
But the argument goes on, about half of the people are killed (or "accidented") and the rest are sucked in by a black hole created by the asteroid crash.
Of course, you have to say that the almost three hours of play feel much longer, the roles are just cliché images and the plot as a whole remains somewhat arbitrary.
The premiere audience still laughed a lot and gave great applause.
The ensemble deserves it, but the piece itself doesn't.