Cruises are booming. But not for Bodo Kirchhoff. Instead of a voyage around the world, he lets us share in his amusingly sarcastic refusal of the world of luxury liners: At the request of a shipping line's PR lady, a not entirely unknown writer is to present readings from his novels on board. A fee, an outside cabin with balcony, full board and many other comforts sound highly tempting. If only it weren't for the obligatory 90-page questionnaire for "guest artists". Instead of filling it in, the author writes an entertaining letter of refusal to the lady he has never met. Alongside all its social criticism, this quietly develops into a letter of longing for dreams never lived out… Ilja Richter is more than just a gifted reader. With his acting skill, he reads the text not from the distance of a narrator but takes us into the emotional worlds of the author. A master of the high art of the humorous recital, the evening with and through him becomes a delightful experience that sets the mood for your next cruise. Or perhaps not. (Frankfurter Verlagsanstalt) 90 minutes (with interval) Synopsis: A misanthropic novelist lives with his almost deaf little dog in an apartment. A letter from a woman he has never met stirs his male imagination. It is not an internet portal for lonely hearts that takes centre stage here. The enquiry from an event manager to the author about possible readings aboard a luxury liner becomes, for its recipient, the occasion for an entertaining "refusal". For the man who shies away from people actually wants to be among them. The letter to the unknown woman from a well-known but lonely eccentric consists of nothing but comic stories which, barely written down, become reality. At least in the novelist's imagination. He depicts the airs and graces of an over-sated society. But it is also about his own un-sated longing for love. The behaviour of people aboard a cruise ship, crossed with the unlived life of a mature man, culminates in one hope: the novelist would see himself with his dark stories as a reader aboard only if the event manager were to accompany him on the voyage. The special twist of this production is this: Kirchhoff's original text is spoken and performed by Richter as a prisoner in a cell, and: the dog exists as little as the many whisky bottles from which the author drinks. Drunk on his own cascades of words pouring outwards, the monologue remains a comic commentary on a world gone off the rails. Ilja Richter first stood on a Berlin stage — and on any stage at all — at the age of nine (Renaissance Theater, 1961). From the age of sixteen he hosted the POP-SHOW "HOT AND SWEET" on ZDF (1969/1970), the forerunner of the now legendary DISCO. From the age of thirty he turned to the theatre. Countless film and television parts are, for him, pleasant side tracks. More than 50 theatre productions — from comedy to tragedy — make up the "internship" he has now been running for 50 years. Highlights? In his opinion: the NIBELUNGENFESTSPIELE in Worms under Dieter Wedel, his DOOLITTLE in MY FAIR LADY, and RICHARD III at the Deutsches Theater Göttingen. But also the comedy "DIE SOCKEN OPUS 124" with Dieter Hallervorden (in 2009 as the opening premiere of Berlin's Schlosspark Theater, directed by Katharina Thalbach). In 2016 Ilja Richter launched his first musical solo evening, "DURCH KREISLERS BRILLE" — a homage to the Viennese cabaret poet.
Bodo Kirchhoff — Einladung zu einer Kreuzfahrt — The New Reading with Ilja Richter
