"Sunset Boulevard"

Götzis goes Hollywood

It's getting American in Götzis: the classic "Sunset Boulevard" is being staged.(Bild: Mathis Fotografie)

Performed by Musiktheater Vorarlberg.(Bild: Mathis Fotografie)

This year, the Musiktheater Vorarlberg Götzis is presenting the musical "Sunset Boulevard" by Andrew Lloyd Webber. What the audience can expect this year: 

A silent movie diva lives in a dilapidated villa with her butler, who was once her discoverer and husband. She hasn't had an engagement for twenty years, but still believes she is still a star. Max von Mayerling, as the butler is now called, constantly fakes fan mail. The diva, Norma Desmond, dreams of a new film "Salome" with her in the title role and has written a script for it that is "longer than Wagner's Ring". But Salome was supposed to be a very young girl, and the era of silent movies is long gone.

The quirky couple Norma and Max are soon joined by the penniless screenwriter Joe Gilles, who eventually becomes Norma's lover. He benefits from her, but feels uncomfortable in her world. Finally, Norma actually receives an offer from Paramount. She sees her return to the movie business coming, but they only want her car. The audience in Götzis AmBach will get to see this cool vintage car for real. Several details of the stage set, designed by Vorarlberg artist Roland Adlassnig, also point to the world of film. As in a studio, the MTVO orchestra sits on stage and not in the pit. It will be conducted by Michael Mader, who has already conducted "Orpheus in the Underworld" and "My Fair Lady" in Götzis and works primarily at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich.

He sees Webber's music, which was written after 1990 (incidentally based on a 1950 film by Billy Wilder), as a "very good mixture of jazz and classical orchestral treatment", with the symphonic instrumentation complemented by two keyboards, electric guitar and guitar and saxophones. In contrast to Webber's well-known musicals, "a hit would never have been established. But when you hear the songs or ballads, you think you know them all, that's how catchy they are," explains Mader.

Another director from the Bavarian State Opera is Andreas Weirich, for whom "Sunset Boulevard" is a reckoning "with Hollywood's appearance and reality". As crazy as all the characters in this play are, Weidrich can also understand their actions. Norma (Dora Kutschi-Doceva), who is manipulative and thoroughly evil, but also childlike, the butler (Riccardo di Francesco) as a mysterious string-puller and Joe (Samuel Tobias Klausner), who is corrupted by his poverty. (The performances run until October 13, plus one in Lustenau)