LATEST REVIEWS

Stage Director HENDRIK MÜLLER deeply moved public and press with his staging of Poulenc's "Dialogues des Carmélites in sets by Rifail Ajdarpasic & costumes by Ariane Isabell Unfried at SH Landestheater Flensburg 🗞️"... Director HENDRIK MÜLLER tells this story straightforwardly and without contemporary interludes. He trusts the libretto, the music and the characters. Together with set designer Rifail Ajdarpasic, he creates an open space that reveals relationships rather than framing or commenting on them. The production does not impose itself; it gives conflicts space. It is precisely from this that it derives its tension, to which Ariane Isabell Unfried’s costumes also contribute....HENDRIK MÜLLER meticulously explores the relationships within this group. He relies less on grand gestures than on subtle shifts in glances, postures and reactions. This gives rise to tensions that can be intuitively perceived and do not require an intellectual explanation.... .... It is precisely in the interplay between the Carmelite nuns that the production reveals one of its greatest strengths. As the evening progresses, the individual sisters step in front of the curtain. There, their religious name, their secular name, their year of birth and the date on which they all died are projected. In this way, the Carmelite nuns do not form a faceless collective, but a community of clearly distinguishable women....The final scene of this production derives its extraordinary impact from the fact that it does not depict the execution of the Carmelite nuns in a naturalistic manner, but translates it into a powerful symbolic visual language. During the *Salve Regina*, one nun after another leaves the stage. Shortly afterwards, the dull thud of the falling guillotine is heard each time... The violence itself remains unseen and takes place solely in the audience’s imagination. It is precisely this restraint that shifts the focus from the brutality of the execution to the women’s inner resolve and their conscious decision to remain true to their faith. As a result, their martyrdom is experienced not as passive suffering, but as an expression of a self-determined choice of faith.... The nuns are wearing soiled white wedding dresses and holding black shoes in their hands. The wedding dress likely refers to the Christian image of the nun as the “Bride of Christ” and thus to the hope of ultimate union with Christ. The stains, however, strip this symbol of any sentimental idealization. They tell of a journey through fear, persecution, and suffering and make it clear that the sisters do not reach their fulfillment unscathed, but rather marked by their experiences.... The black shoes—which are no longer worn, but merely held in their hands and finally left on the floor—seem like the last vestiges of worldly existence. It seems as though the women have already left their earthly journey behind....Suspended from ropes above them are the Carmelite nuns’ habits. They look like abandoned shells and serve as a reminder of the life in the convent that the nuns are leaving behind for good at the moment of their martyrdom. ...Thus, the final scene conveys two levels simultaneously. Acoustically, the historical sequence of the execution is made tangible by the recurring sound of the guillotine. Visually, however, the staging depicts a spiritual transition. The women are not, first and foremost, walking towards death, but towards the fulfilment of their calling. This poetic simplification lends the final scene great emotional and spiritual depth, making it a striking conclusion to Poulenc’s opera. If I were an AI, I would write that this was an evening of opera that will linger in the memory for a long time. As a human being, I prefer to say: ‘This evening moved me deeply. The standing ovations at the final performance were just as clear an expression of this as the silence immediately before the final applause...’”