Kasimir & Karoline

On Saturday (the 3rd of January) I was invited by my best friend, Siw-Marie, to the National Theatre in Stockholm (Dramaten).

She works there as an extra in Uncle Vanya (Onkel Vanja) by Chekhov (Tjechov).
The play she invited me to see tonight was Kasimir & Karoline by Ödon von Horváth.
I'm not familiar with this - more or less - Austrian author and playwright to any larger extent, I must admit.
He was born in 1901 in Fiume (or Rijeka) in Croatia and died in Paris in 1938.

The play is situated in the Weimar republic of the 1920's. It's about a young couple - a man and a woman - and how their relationship gradually changes when he looses his job.
This event in their life, poses important questions concerning relations, power, social stratas in society and the differences and similiarities between people despite their social belonging.
It's a story about life and death, about trying to raise oneself above the vegetating 'masses' among other things.
It's also a play about the rising nazism and the social-economical basis for their success and how people tend to search for a strong leader and radical change when problems arise. To this could be added the stigmatization of 'the others', notably foreigners and, what could be regarded as, 'misfits'.

The acting was - with some exceptions - brilliant.

I would like to point out Magnus Roosman, Rebecka Hemse, Johan Holmberg (who's one of my favourites at the Swedish National Theatre/Dramaten) and Erik Ehn.

Well worth seeing as it also give the spectator the opportunity to observe some Brechtian Verfremdungseffekt, used in this play.

In the youtube-clip above you find some interviews with the theatrical manager and the actors in Swedish but also an interview with the director of the play, Michael Thalheimer, in English.