In their unconditional belief in the one love, the only true love that defies every obstacle, Romeo and Juliet are perhaps the most famous lovers in the world. Breathing fresh life into these characters and convincingly conveying their intoxication of feeling is, for an actor, both a joy and a challenge. In preparing for the role, it was perfectly clear to Roman Pertl that he had to separate his own approach to Romeo from the expectations of others. He watched videos of Kurt Cobain and Jim Morrison. "These two musicians were excessive in the way they lived, the way they practised their art; they needed the excess. Romeo, too, is a young man who surrenders himself to something. That's why I looked for a way into his emotional world through these two musicians." Music also plays a major role in director Matthias Faltz's staging at the Landestheater Hessen in Marburg. With a mixture of pop, rock and Renaissance music, the emotional charge of the drama is underpinned and heightened. "There are several passages of text that were set to songs, which we actors then sing. That's really cool and, for me, fits perfectly with the way I play and understand Romeo." It was the younger audience members in particular who were repeatedly surprised by the play's earthy language, Roman Pertl recounts. Frank Günther keeps his Shakespeare translations linguistically very close to the original tone, which to the layperson sounds in places more like a modern interpretation than centuries-old language. So when there is talk of Romeo going off "to shag", a murmur runs through the audience that the actors cannot fail to hear. But it is precisely this mixture of unbridled love, earthy language and grand drama that defines the play. And when this drama is performed not with grand pathos but as a believable rock staging, the auditorium goes wild. Further dates: 28 April 2017, 20:00 guest performance in Rüsselsheim; 5 May 2017, 19:30 Landestheater Marburg The play is set to be revived in the next season.
In the Throes of Love
