Am Anfang war das Feuer

Robert and Charlotte were a couple for seven years. Now Charlotte calls off what Robert thought was so harmonious. The time as a twosome is over. Temporarily, Robert is allowed to live in the basement. This includes use of kitchen and bathroom, but excludes any claim for love. Victor lives with Charlotte now, a “symptom” of their no longer functioning relationship. But when the latter leaves, Robert is still there. And when John arrives and when the Baby arrives, Robert is still there as well, in his basement hole. All begging and pleading is to no avail, he will not budge.

The absurdity of this cohabitation isn’t based on outer circumstances. It is rather the result of a perpetual fight for the preservation of the innermost core. Secrets stay secrets, even when they are revealed to the other person. And concessions turn out to be empty promises. With an extremely entertaining sense of humour and a sharp eye, Reto Finger describes man’s will, man’s failure and ultimately man’s instinctual revolt.

There was a time in their lives when they were made for each other. They were very close, got along well, and there was reason to assume they had found a partner for life: Anna and Hans. They got married and had a child as a crowning achievement. Unique. But with the second child, the discontent arrives: Hans has a vision of a new social order, away from the small family. His specific search for a place and kindred spirits causes a terrible relationship crisis. Anna feels like he betrays her and the children. The suggested new happiness clashes with her idea of life: polygamy instead of monogamy, autonomy instead of bourgeoisie, and freedom within a commune. The marriage fails. The long story of a separation begins.
Hans and Anna spend a lifetime arguing with each other about the big and seemingly small things, the hopes and disappointments, the ideas and instincts. And furthermore, the play is about the search for a better society, about the inability to understand another human being, about experiences and mistakes and the painful realisation that a lifetime sometimes isn’t enough to forgive everything.

“If you want to talk about the moral of a story it is appropriate to look at the art of the poet. In Reto Finger’s plays, the characters express themselves through images, and the images shine through the words.” Feridun Zaimoglu

At the centre of the story is Robert Keller, who, after 25 years, returns to his parental home he and his brothers had to leave as children. Together with them, he wants to have a celebration that is also meant to be a victory over the past: no fighting anymore, no grieving about the parents, who have left the family. But next to the invited guests, the beautiful stranger Vera appears. She knows that you shouldn’t dig too deep in the garden of the house…
Der Fall des Robert K. is a captivating Swiss thriller, an abysmal story about the longing to be able to eradicate the past with the passing of time. And the lengths someone would go to not to be confronted with the consequences of what happened, even after 25 years.

Everything starts with the loss of a pair of pants. It throws the life of civil servant family Maske into disarray. Son Christian, a product of the commotion about the lost trousers, manages (years later) the economic climb to become a major shareholder and boss of a mining company. Calculating and egotistical, he pushes away everything in his way and doesn’t even stop at his own family. He accuses his mother of being the illegitimate child of a French nobleman to be able to climb society’s ladder even further. At last, as an old man, he wants to leave the company to his daughter. But when she doesn’t conduct war business the way he wants it, the sickly old man interferes again. His triumph over his own children is short-lived and has deadly consequences.

Carl Sternheim’s trilogy Die Hose – Der Snob – 1913 is a sharp-tongued satire about bourgeois family configurations and the reckless pursuit of profit. Intendant Anselm Weber staged the cycle for the Schauspielhaus in a new adaptation by Reto Finger.

Everything starts with the loss of a pair of pants. It throws the life of civil servant family Maske into disarray. Son Christian, a product of the commotion about the lost trousers, manages (years later) the economic climb to become a major shareholder and boss of a mining company. Calculating and egotistical, he pushes away everything in his way and doesn’t even stop at his own family. He accuses his mother of being the illegitimate child of a French nobleman to be able to climb society’s ladder even further. At last, as an old man, he wants to leave the company to his daughter. But when she doesn’t conduct war business the way he wants it, the sickly old man interferes again. His triumph over his own children is short-lived and has deadly consequences.

Carl Sternheim’s trilogy Die Hose – Der Snob – 1913 is a sharp-tongued satire about bourgeois family configurations and the reckless pursuit of profit. Intendant Anselm Weber staged the cycle for the Schauspielhaus in a new adaptation by Reto Finger.

In the kebab street, the cars are honking as if Hoffenheim had won the German football cup. The people are queuing in front of NORMA. Biking pants are €6.99, beer cans 39 cents. Three Indians are playing cricket in the bomb hole. Two old Turks are watching them. The bomb hole is really called Swansea-square, but everyone just calls it bomb hole. A sloppy plane is looking for Mannheim airport and, on the balcony across, in the central institute for mental health, someone is screaming for his life. It smells terribly of chocolate, but everyone pretends not to smell it. People are meeting around square H5, seemingly coincidentally. An honest cashier, a manager in love, an unemployed dreamer, a depressed housewife, her terminally ill husband and an uninhibited drunkard. Until, suddenly, there is a shot.

Reto Finger, former in-house author of the Nationaltheater, has lived in H7/2 for two years and was inspired to write Norma in that time.

Everything starts with the loss of a pair of pants. It throws the life of civil servant family Maske into disarray. Son Christian, a product of the commotion about the lost trousers, manages (years later) the economic climb to become a major shareholder and boss of a mining company. Calculating and egotistical, he pushes away everything in his way and doesn’t even stop at his own family. He accuses his mother of being the illegitimate child of a French nobleman to be able to climb society’s ladder even further. At last, as an old man, he wants to leave the company to his daughter. But when she doesn’t conduct war business the way he wants it, the sickly old man interferes again. His triumph over his own children is short-lived and has deadly consequences.

Carl Sternheim’s trilogy Die Hose – Der Snob – 1913 is a sharp-tongued satire about bourgeois family configurations and the reckless pursuit of profit. Intendant Anselm Weber staged the cycle for the Schauspielhaus Bochum in a new adaptation by Reto Finger.

“The other isn’t good in difficult times.” The priest says this, in a lonesome village somewhere in the mountains. A self-serving declaration, made for the hermetic village community, but mostly serving as self-protection. Unspoken truths shall stay exactly what they’ve always been: covered, non-existent.

It doesn't help. The outside world intrudes. Hikers from the city, even now, shortly before the snow starts falling. Tobias for example. He talks to Hanna. Hanna, who is always standing on the station’s square, always when she doesn’t have to help her father, who calls her “boy”, on the farm, or the priest, who forces physical intimacy on her, on the cemetery. She tells Tobias about the calving cow, about the old, stinking man and about Malcovi’s daughter, who is singing in the mountains.

The times are certainly difficult. For Hanna’s family, too – Hanna’s brother died two years ago. His death hides an open family secret. And when it is completely revealed, the only thing left is silence – or running amok.

Kaltes Land describes how it feels when the corset forced on you doesn’t fit anymore and is close to bursting, in simple, poetic language and with highly intense characters. And about how it feels when escape has to fail, because you know nothing apart from your own world and are trapped in your own universe.

If you’re looking at it from a purely theoretical viewpoint, Paul and Jule have found a very mature solution for their duty of care towards the shared child after the divorce. They live in separate flats, but on the same floor. The child can go from parent to parent as much as it wants. This juridical achievement has been going on for three months. That’s a reason to celebrate. Paul hosts a party on the roof of the house. But the evening doesn’t go according to plan. That’s not only Jule’s (who is annoyed by her ex-husband) or Ingo’s (an old school friend, only contacted again because of the need for a lawyer) fault. Because next to Mr. Schlegl, a completely silent guest arrives whose speechlessness on the outermost brink of the roof terrace stimulates revelations. At the end of this protocolled night, nothing is as it was. The arrangement is off, freedom is an illusion and life obviously does not adhere to paragraphs.

In this play, Reto Finger has achieved a masterful observation of the life of people in their mid-thirties. With a crystal-clear eye and fine humour, he thoroughly scours the desires of a society confronted with an abundance of possibilities.

"Everyone has their monologue, their soul-striptease-aria, which is poetically emphasised by Reto Finger. With a light hand, the Swiss playwright, born in 1972, weaves realistic dialogues into these concentrated texts. The play floats between the realms of absurd theatre and authentic soul studies.” (Frankfurter Rundschau)

Homo Hans has quit his job to be self-employed. That makes him very happy. Homo Hans tells potential investors how he sees things. That makes him happy, too. But it also makes him unemployed. Homo Hans withdraws from his wife and child. That makes him less sad, at least. But somehow, he isn’t quite right in the head anymore. Something’s leaking, something’s going wrong in his life. Without a doubt.

“Hans has worked for seven years. For his achievements, he gets a lump of gold. He swaps it several times until he is left with only a whetstone. In the well-known fairy tale, which can be found in the Children’s and Household Tales by the brothers Grimm, the difference between having and being, the art of letting go and the inner freedom resulting from this are discussed. Because even though the material worth gets smaller and smaller with each of Hans’ trades, he becomes happier.
Reto Finger has written a modern adaptation of the Hans in Luck story for the ensemble in Bochum. Homo Hans quits his safe job and tries self-employment. But the desire for higher-faster-further surrounding him seems more and more absurd to him. Piece by piece, Hans exits this world and starts pursuing his personal happiness.” (Announcement Schauspielhaus Bochum)

For Hans im Glück, Reto Finger won the Bern literature prize in 2016 worth 10,000 Swiss franc.

Everyday business in an ordinary town comes to a standstill. A gas explosion? An earthquake? A war? Or a bicycle accident? People at the periphery of a catastrophe of unknown dimension are thrown into distress without being subjected to any acute danger. What is under scrutiny is the resilience, the sense of values and the social competence of people who are robbed of their habitual securities.