The young audience that came to the Burgtheater-Kasino Saturday night for the premiere of Erich Kästner’s “Pünktchen und Anton” might not know Lars von Trier’s “Dogville” let alone floor plans for apartment buildings much less apartment outlines. However it is certain that Cornelia Richter’s staging demands fantasy which is a pleasant contrast to children’s theater frequently overloaded by the scenography.
No, this is no “Schneekönigin” (“Ice queen”) as Annette Raffalt worked tirelessly with plenty of pomp pompously slogged on the stage of the Akademietheater last year. The upper class flat in which Pünktchen and her stressed parents live is marked out on the black stage floor using white duct tape; there is a hint of a kitchen from a fridge likewise the living room from a dining table and the nursery from a bed with a provocative flat screen above it. Even the road in front of the parental house is simply called “Straße” (“Street”). A plain casino wall provides the background.
The director, born in Lienz 1982, provided the children’s book classic’s staging of 1931 with a gentle facelift, and yet did not necessarily haul the setting into the present. Admittedly, Anton and his friend Klepperbein use a smartphone to ascertain the phone number of Pünktchen’s father, they beg for euros and get upset when all they get is 50 cents, but these are the only references to the present day. The rest stays timeless anyway: the rich are doing well, the poor and the ill not so much. Children are “good” by nature and innocently connect and build bridges despite the social classes (at least in an ideal world).
Thus Pünktchen, neglected by her nanny Fräulein (Miss) Andacht, stands by her friend Anton who has to take care of his sick mother and tries to earn money by selling second-hand shoes and shoelaces on the street. And since Pünktchen’s parents are too busy to read bed time stories or to go horse riding with her anyway, she crams the horse riding gear, the books and expensive designer clothes into a bag and tries selling them on the street. The character of the writer, sitting in the middle of the stage at a desk with a typewriter, who introduces the story-line and even enters into a meta-dialogue with the protagonists, is holding this concise plot together.
Martin Schwab plays that warm-hearted seemingly all-knowing man full of benevolence and tending towards to slight clumsiness. Schwab also gallantly features in several supporting roles such as the rendez-vous of the housekeeper Berta, or as the policeman. In fact, the director of the Burgtheater Karin Bergman explained that Christina Cervenka initially had to fill in for Sylvie Rohrer who became ill two days earlier and who was originally cast for Pünktchen’s mother. Despite the short notice Cervenka plays the aloof mother who is constantly stressed by social engagements in a fashion so convincing, that her husband on stage, Dirk Nocker, struggles to fully get into his role of the unkind patriarch. Adina Vetter as Fräulein (Miss) Andacht is the opposite of the general notion of a nanny as her lack of interest in the child almost matches the mother’s. She rather takes the little girl out with her where Pünktchen trails along with Anton while Fräulein (Miss) Andacht spends her time with her dubious friend Robert (Robert Reinagl). Adriana Gerstner and Florian Klingler make a confident and lively young couple – even though one slightly doubts their social divide.
The dark atmosphere that is not only due to the stage design (Sarah Haas) is reinforced by Rainer’s use a youth orchestra that is involved in the play time and again. The young musicians using a cello, a bassoon and a trumpet deliver a solid musical performance and neatly fit into the altogether compelling ensemble. In spite of the abundance of text and the urgent request for fantasy the young spectators aged 7 and above proved themselves continuously attentive throughout the two- and- a – half hour evening, including breaks, and in the end were thoroughly awed. No effects seemingly can make the biggest impact after all.”