MOBY DICK

In the organizer's words:

MOBY DICK

based on the novel of the same name by Herman Melville

adapted from the American by Matthias Jendis for the stage by Malte Ubenauf

After Ibsen's Peer Gynt, another master of the art of storytelling takes the floor in the second half of the season. A narrator who asks his audience to call him Ishmael enters the stage of the Residenztheater with his sailor's yarn. What follows is a veritable monster of a tale: Ismael signs on to the "Pequod", an old whaler, and sets sail on this floating factory of tranquility. However, the aim of this journey is not just - as it turns out - the bloody exploitation of the world's oceans and their giant marine mammals, but the personal, hate-filled vendetta of a "godless, godlike man", the one-legged Captain Ahab. With a power of speech reminiscent of Shakespeare, the captain swears his crew to search the seas for the legendary white whale that once tore off his leg and hunt it down.

"I have written a wicked book", Melville tells his idol Nathaniel Hawthorne in a letter - referring to his work "Moby Dick", which in many respects gets out of hand. Published in 1851, the novel received little attention during Melville's lifetime. It was not until the 20th century, thirty years after its author's death, that it was rediscovered for literary modernism and as a masterpiece. Yet "Moby Dick", the book, is as unique as Moby Dick, the white whale: a tale that goes beyond the familiar - a hybrid of adventure novel, encyclopaedia, contemplation of nature, philosophical speculation, Elizabethan drama, biblical eloquence, nautical jokes and crude wordplay. The book and the whale - both are an enigma, a cipher, open to the interpretations of the respective present day: Is "Moby Dick" the drama of a fanatic or rather of those who are prepared to follow a demagogue's delusion to their doom? Does it describe an epic battle between the forces of nature and human will to dominate or the search for meaning and significance in a cosmos devoid of meaning? Or is planet Earth itself like a ship in the ocean of space? But then who the hell is this Moby Dick?

Director Stefan Pucher, well known to local audiences, returns to Munich and brings Melville's magnum opus to the stage in his first work at the Residenztheater.

ARTISTIC DIRECTION

Director Stefan Pucher
Stage Barbara Ehnes
Costumes Annabelle Witt
Music Christopher Uhe
Lighting Markus Schadel
Video Chris Kondek
Dramaturgy Ewald Palmetshofer

Price information:

10€ for students