Les Miserables at the Gärtnerplatztheater in a production by Joseph E. Köpplinger is the fantasy of musical theatre come true: every song is an artistic delight, every scene as beautiful as a painting.
The global blockbuster Les Miserables in a production by Gärtnerplatz director Joseph Köpplinger is staged in the 2023/24 season as a co-production of Theater St. Gallen (Switzerland) and Gärtnerplatztheater in Munich. The premiere in St. Gallen had taken place December 9, 2023, review here (in German).
The premiere in Munich took place March 22 at the Gärtnerplatztheater. Valjean actor Armin Kahl, who was taken out of action by an infection after only a short time, had to be replaced by alternative performer Filippo Strocchi. In the first act, Strocchi only performed the role off-stage, in the second act he took over the part completely.
After a rather unusual premiere, minutes of standing applause awaited this special play in this fantastic production and with actors in top form.
This review is available in German language, too.
For all those who have not seen Les Mis so far, the plot is described in the review of the stage concert in London.
Production in St. Gallen/ Gärtnerplatztheater (Director: Josef E. Köpplinger)
Stage (Rainer Sinell) and lighting (Andreas Enzler)
The stage design offers the soloists a lot of free space in particular, relying entirely on their presence, which the performers use in an impressive way. The well thought-out stage design concept also works through the backdrops:
High silhouettes of houses occasionally loom darkly at the sides and frame the scenery. When they are moved to the center of the stage, they constrict the scene in an oppressive way. Overall, the effect on stage, especially in the Paris setting and in the scenes in which Javert appears, is based more on the concept of film noir, which I find incredibly atmospheric.
The centerpiece of the production is the revolving stage, which brings the scenes from the back to the front of the stage. Only when the scenery is turned to the front the protagonists come to life. The scene is then rotated backwards and disappears behind a black curtain. Scenes glide silently into one another. The revolving stage also allows the front view of the Thenardiers‘ inn, for example, as well as their kitchen, so that the location can even be changed within a song.
Another intense scene is also based on the revolving stage: at the end of her life and suffering, Fantine, lying on her deathbed, envisions her daughter as a fantasy image in her mind’s eye. Finally, she dies and the scenery disappears with the revolving stage to the back, while little Cosette comes forward and sings about her fantasy of a loving mother caring for her.
There is also a metal bridge construction. In the prison camp, it is the place of the guards, and it also allows Javert to figuratively rise above the others. But those who rise high, fall low: it is precisely this bridge from which Javert jumps to his suicide.
For the ensemble, the bridge is a shelter and a parade ground for the whores at the harbor.
A comprehensive and well thought-out lighting arrangement supports this stage design. Right at the beginning, we see the prisoners in the prison camp in the quarry. The spotlights symbolize the merciless rays of the sun, under whose blazing heat the inmates suffer.
As previously mentioned, Javert always has a rather subdued atmosphere, but the stars shine individually against a black night sky – as does Eponine, who walks lonely circles in Paris at night fantasizing that Marius would be with her.
In Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, the dead students appear in the background in the brightest light of the afterlife, while the atmosphere in the sewage channels beneath Paris is haunting.
A big compliment for this coherent stage and lighting design.
Costume design (Uta Meenen)
Jean Valjean and Fantine form the great bracket around the whole plot, in other words the beginning and the end: Valjean accompanies Fantine as she dies – at the end, Fantine returns and accompanies Valjean to his death. Roughly speaking, the relationship can be summarized as an ideal: a give and take, an existence for each other. I always had the idea that if Fantine had not died, Valjean and she would have been the perfect couple and, with Cosette as their daughter, would have formed a loving family.
The fact that this idea strikes me even more clearly than usual is due to the costume idea at work here: Valjean does not appear in a yellow-brown shirt at the beginning of the prison camp, as is familiar from most productions. Instead, he wears a gray-blue smock. Later, we see Fantine in the factory in a similar blue, and Cosette, who has to work for the Thenardiers, also wears a similar color (as do all the ordinary workers). It seems to me that these three people are linked together in the play, which I think is wonderful, as they are never actually together as a trio.
The grown-up Cosette appears in blue again. This time it’s not a faded gray-blue, but a radiant, deep blue. On the one hand, she has left the shabby surroundings of the past behind her; on the other hand, blue has always been described as a sign of withdrawal into the inner world, i.e. introversion. To date, the young girl has had few opportunities to open up to the outside world. With her bright blue underdress, Cosette presents herself as a radiant but shy innocent (blue has always been associated with the Virgin Mary). Incidentally, Marius also wears blue when he first meets Cosette!
Her father Jean Valjean, the other hand, is dressed in violet: It is the symbol of humility, virtue and penance and nothing else could suit this character better, as well as the attributes of insight and profundity, which are associated with violet, too.
The students are dressed rather neutrally, with beige and shades of brown as the main colors. The association with the earth is not far off. They see themselves as the well-grounded, representatives of the common people who have both feet on the ground. Likewise, beige is associated with timelessness. Brown is the color of strength and maturity. Alternatively, beige can also appear dirty, just as the students are probably considered to be the absolute dirt in Javert’s eyes.
Interestingly, Enjolras is not wearing the red gilet with the golden edging with which he is usually depicted at the barricades. He is thus not stylized as a military leader, but remains a leader among his peers. I found this very coherent, it emphasizes the group’s intentions more than when the focus is on a more military-fanatical Enjolras. The students also lack the tricolore accessories, which moves the whole thing a little away from France and makes it look more universal overall.
Like the students as a group, the women on the barricades present themselves as a unified group: the grey-blue workers‘ outfits are somehow mixed with red, the color of passion, but also of blood.
There are no surprises with Javert’s outfit: He wears black. A black aura is always intimidating for the other person, but black also has the meaning of prestige and power.
The costume, set design and lighting direction are carefully coordinated, as are the choreographed movements of the actors. Combined, they create a deeply impressive visual beauty.
The various crafts are so beautifully intertwined that every scene looks like a painting. I think you can see what I mean in the following pictures:
Orchester
What a blessing to hear a live orchestra like that of the Gärtnerplatztheater!
Koen Schoots said in an interview he had become more relaxed over time and no longer would subject everything to the speed. You can feel that. The show takes on a dynamic all of its own. He allows for a little more time in the right places, builds up the tension a little differently. It skilfully heads towards the climaxes and then goes into full swing. The Les Mis steam engine doesn’t just roll over everything. You have to dare to do that, says Koen Schoots himself. And for me it worked out perfectly.
The orchestra of the Gärtnerplatz is unbeatable in its magnificence. The sound engineers have done a great job, too.
Koen Schoots at the conductor’s podium is a phenomenal conductor and arranger. On the one hand, the orchestra pays attention to the delicacy with which, for example, a Filippo Strocchi can sing his notes or the fragility of Fantine. On the other hand, it skillfully balances the growing emotions of Eponine or Javert before unleashing its full power in daring crescendos. The great ballads come to an unstoppable climax until you have the feeling that either I or the performer on stage is about to burst.
An absolute artistic delight and a magnificent example of the extent to which an orchestra can carry tension for the audience and thus help to steer their emotions.
St. Gallen and Gärtnerplatztheater
I am reporting on my own experiences (I come here on my own accord – sorry, wrong musical), which does not focus on evaluating which location did what better or worse. Because emotions are subjective. However, a comparison does illustrate how and where small things have a different effect. That’s why it’s deliberately not St. Gallen versus Munich, but and.
One aspect of comparison is definitely the stage: I don’t know whether the stage in St. Gallen is actually any larger, but it certainly seems much bigger. The auditorium is much wider. In the Gärtnerplatztheater, you sit relatively close to the action in all seats, which seems more compact in the smaller space.
And that changes the musical experience. In St. Gallen, the panoramic view of the action is fascinating. The plot unfolds in a very exciting way, showing how everything interacts and weaves the fabric of the story. The background characters seem more alive because the audience has a broader view. This makes you more open to what the supporting characters are up to.
In Munich, solo numbers or duets seem more intense and vivid. Everything seems a little more concise, more physical, closer, even a little bit more intimate. The focus while watching is more on the individual characters involved in the respective scene and their introspection. The energy on stage is perceived differently, the physicality can be experienced more clearly. It feels more like a chamber play.
When a chair is thrown, as in the duel at Fantine’s deathbed, it’s even more of a crash on the smaller stage–in the truest sense of the word. I didn’t notice that blood was actually spurting on the barricades in St. Gallen, but it makes the experience of the barricade scene in Munich even more shocking.
The audience experiences a similar moment of shock right at the beginning of the play, when a guard shoots an inmate of the prison camp. I had never seen this before in any other production, and it underlines how uncompromisingly God-pleasing – valuable – life is separated from unworthy life here.
Timing
It was particularly noticeable in Munich how the main actors in particular played out the scenes wonderfully down to the last detail, how much time they sometimes allowed themselves. That was striking, especially because the production otherwise drives everything forward so energetically.
The end of the scene with the Bishop of Digne is an example of this: How long Armin Kahl as Valjean and the bishop look at each other while the latter slowly moves away using the revolving stage. This is a moment to savor, as mentioned above. And that in turn emphasizes the effect that the Bishop’s actions have on Valjean.
Goosebump-inducing moments that are certainly rarely experienced so consciously. But what remains for everyone is the feeling of magnificent timing, the right speed and the perfect interlocking of forward playing and pausing and savoring.
In Munich, you can hear the best duel between Valjean and Javert in a long time. Within the piece, the protagonists clash, then part again, there is a moment to breathe and a final exchange of blows for the time being. This clash between two forces that are so universally opposed is particularly overwhelming in equal measure.
It is already clear that there will only be peace when one side has won, just as Javert sings at the end before his suicide:
There is nothing on earth that we share
It is either Valjean or Javert!
And it is always a very special performance for me when it becomes clear somewhere in the performance – textually, too – what was already perceived as a feeling beforehand. Köpplinger’s direction must have passed on very clear ideas and instructions and the performers have implemented them with great sensitivity, so that a foreshadowing evoked by means of the staging is later, sometimes much later, confirmed by the sung text.
Actors and their roles
At this point, I will go into the design of the roles as I perceived them. This is all interpretation on my part, every viewer can perceive things differently, and on other days with a different cast a completely different dynamic can unfold.
Javert: Daniel Gutmann
Daniel Gutmann plays his Javert strictly and in a military manner. Javert is a man who divides the world into a right side and a wrong side, both of which are God-given. He has consciously chosen the right side in his eyes, has worked for it and probably pursues his idea of this world relentlessly and forcefully.
I never shall yield
Till we come face to face
He vows to capture Valjean in order to maintain the God-given order.
Gutmann’s Javert shows a vocal doggedness that escalates to fanaticism.
With sharp, piercing and yet completely smooth tones, he sings his contempt down on the scum of the earth. His voice is so penetrating that you would think he was speaking through a megaphone the whole time. Soldierly, steely, cold.
Now there are songs that everyone knows, that you can always listen to and have heard hundreds of times by different artists. And sometimes a song fits a performer so well that you never want to hear it performed by anyone else again. That’s what happened to me with ”Cold Stars“ from Ludwig2 and Jan Ammann, for example. It’s unimaginable that anyone could bring it closer to me than him. It’s the same with Gethsemane and Drew Sarich.
And it’s the same now with The Star and Daniel Gutmann.
It’s just perfect. You NEVER forget moments like this. Gutmann sings and plays this piece like it’s from another ”star“.
Together with the orchestra, his voice becomes so pure, more furious and louder until the “doorway to paradise”. This interplay between Gutmann’s voice and the orchestra, which he effortlessly takes on, is a phenomenal experience.
The hunt for Valjean becomes his fanatically defended mission in life. The confrontation of two universes anticipates the annihilation of one of the two points of view. As the lettering that opens the performance says: all fanaticism ends in fatalism.
Daniel Gutmann personifies exactly that: this relentlessness, a merciless black-and-white fanaticism. You can literally feel the adrenaline rushing through him when he meets Valjean while tied to the barricade. In the sewers during the final encounter, he fights for his life – not with Valjean, but with himself. He does not have to submit to Valjean. But he personally cannot see any other approach to life existing alongside his own. He realizes this, and this is when he concedes his battle.
He loses this battle of life, just as the students lose theirs. This is designed in parallel: The students fight for their idea of justice, it is their battle of life and they ultimately see it lost. But they remain true to themselves:
Let us die facing our foes.
Again, the reference to the opening quote: all fanaticism leads to fatalism. Interestingly, Enjolras falls shot over a railing, just as Javert falls over one into the Seine.
Javert’s leap into the Seine is impressively resolved: first, Javert resigns his commission by taking off his uniform and the signs of his legal authority. Finally, he undoes his hairband until the strands hang over his shoulder. He almost looks like the hated Valjean in the prison camp at the beginning. This is where the circle closes. Then Javert jumps off the bridge in the background of the stage and all you can see is the white of his shirtsleeves plunging into the depths.
The world I have known is lost in shadow.
It still gives me goosebumps in hindsight: Not only does Javert’s world sink into the shadows, but with this leap Javert, who is the who is the guardian of this world, also disappears into the dark.
A deeply emotional scene.
Valjean: Armin Kahl
Armin Kahl got off to a great start in terms of acting, but it was immediately obvious that something was wrong with his singing. Within a very short time, a respiratory infection put him out of action vocally.
Filippo took over vocally from offstage and Armin Kahl continued to play. This is how it is done from time to time. Only the week before, Kahl himself had been on the road to Linz as a stand-in to lend his voice to the main character in Tootsie (in German) in just such a situation, while the actor on stage continued to act.
From Strocchi’s very first note, I realized that the voice had changed. For experienced listeners, it’s a really strange thing to see one and hear the other.
But even without the voice, Armin Kahl brought a stunning Valjean to the stage. His playback was perfect (and I was really paying attention the whole time). How much of a professional do you have to be to make it all go so smoothly that many people didn’t even notice?
Such a clear, wonderful teamwork between the two of them! And as sad as it is for Armin Kahl to have to abort his own premiere: It was a very special performance for me as a „frequent spectator“, precisely because two full professionals with so much emotion turned this one character into a unit.
Heart-warming applause for Armin Kahl during the intermission, in which the intendant and director of the production, Joseph Köpplinger, brought both actors on stage and clarified the situation.
Read more about Armin’s performance in the St. Gallen review (in German).
Valjean: Filippo Strocchi
Already seen in St. Gallen and confirmed again today: This man is amazing. First of all, I was captivated by how delicately he can sing notes and how softly he lets them fade away at the end. I feel so embraced by the note. It is so comforting, so inviting and, above all, full and warm in the depths.
Filippo Strocchi has a heart-warming scene with little Cosette when he finds her in the forest. The two of them sing a short duet without lyrics, based on Cosette’s Castle On A Cloud. As gently as he touches her, as gently as he looks at her, he sings just as gently and caringly. He has to show severity towards the grown-up Cosette, and he does so consistently, but also with great tenderness.
By then, he had already developed the character so wonderfully: From a despicable condemned man who hates the world, into a beneficiary who initially seeks financial security and later cares for souls.
And I will raise her to the light.
Valjean’s life, which at the beginning he only knows he wants to change for the better, is finally given a purpose in life in Cosette to fulfill this task and he does it with his soul.
Just like the bishop sang:
I have bought your soul for God.
It is precisely this soul that can always be felt in Strocchi’s Valjean.
Valejan is not only visibly ageing, he is also becoming increasingly provident. Strocchi changes his posture, his stature increasingly conveys a sense of responsibility. It becomes clear how he is growing in his mission in life. Strocchi’s Valjean is characterized by this serving part of his character, without neglecting other facets.
When it comes to defending this life’s mission, he does it with a clear physical and vocal presence: throwing chairs at Fantine’s deathbed and putting Javert in his place at the end to save Marius. That’s when his voice takes on Javert’s volume.
As I described earlier, I’m moved when lines of text from different scenes in the show suddenly intertwine in a way you might not have connected before. It’s all in the listening. And no matter who is singing, you always hear it a little differently. This time I have realized for myself that Marius is already writing in his letter to Cosette:
I pray that god will bring me home
And Filippo Strocchi sang it in such a way that you naturally have to associate the bring him home with the line that follows later in the well-known showstopper. He is the person responsible for the two young people. He takes care of them, their idea, their lives.
„Bring him home“ is intended as a prayer, but here it is a gentle expression of inner feelings. At the end, it becomes more pleading. You can hear an inner longing, a deeply cherished wish: he has always protected Cosette and now her fortune, for which Valjean feels responsible, is no longer in his hands. It is a very gentle „entrusting oneself to a higher power“.
I love this performance, the interpretation of the role, the voice. Filippo Strocchi is a really special Valjean.
Eponine: Katia Bischoff
She feels her dream of happiness with Marius. When Katia Bischoff closes her eyes and sings about her lifelong joy, which she has tied to Marius, I can feel her dream of happiness all the way into the auditorium. This is exactly what it takes for the role of Eponine, then her story becomes a tragic emotional rollercoaster ride. Because how else can you understand a person who willingly puts herself in the line of fire with the words: “still I would rather be with you.”
Katia Bischoff’s Eponine is completely relatable. She acts confidently and boldly towards her Marius and that’s exactly what she is in his presence. Then she feels alive, then she has an idea of life, then her life has value.
Eponine can only exist with Marius. Without Marius, there is no future for Eponine. In the German translation, she sings:
I miss him, the world has lost its colors
The trees bare, the people pale, the streets full of scars
And Eponine follows this path consistently: she dies, but for her that is the inevitable sacrifice. It is a very gentle kind of fanaticism that leads to her downfall.
She cannot have her Marius anyway. And her death gives her one last moment with him. Here the world apparently loses its color for her: she loses blood, she loses her color.
Katia Bischoff’s Eponine is such a fine person who doesn’t fit into the harsh world of the streets of Paris. Sheltered as a child, unlike Cosette, Eponine has retained the tenderness of this little girl.
The grown-up Eponine dreams of a different life, just like little Cosette once did, and openly envies her.
Thenardier: Alexander Franzen
For me, this production has a number of match winners. All of them, without exception, are terrific, some with a performance worthy of every award, for example Wietske van Tongeren. And then, after half an hour, Alexander Franzen thumps onto the stage!
I always struggle a bit with the Thenardier because he’s hard to grasp. But that’s a good thing, since that’s probably how the character was originally intended. In fact, this opens up a huge amount of potential for how the character can be portrayed.
Jogi Kaiser (in the premiere of St. Gallen) has given the innkeeper a shabbiness that is second to none. With him, I had the feeling that he was real scum, that he had sunken really low (see St. Gallen, in German).
Alexander Franzen takes the edge off Thenardier’s demeanor a little and uses a deliberate, light showman attitude – especially in Master of the House. Deliberate because he finds his guests ridiculous and despises them. But he also needs them. That’s when he becomes a rip-off artist. Not like Jogi Kaiser as scum. But deliberately and also a bit more demanding, more aggressive. The rip-off attitude is loud and unscrupulous, but develops in character from aggressive peasant cunning to an open willingness to commit crimes.
The color of Alexander Franzen’s voice is unique. A voice that sounds so expansive is not something you often encounter.
Sometimes the Thenardier actors deliberately use their voices to play the torn, sounding a little boozy and throaty. In comparison, Franzen sounds clear and loud. He comes across as frighteningly penetrating, which lends the character an unpleasant quality. A horrible guy, this Thenardier – but on the other hand, it’s somehow fascinating to see how he cheats his way through life.
Franzens creates his character with facial expressions and great gestures to accompany his voluminous singing, making him absolutely captivating. I can hardly describe it, but this Thenardier is so present, so on the spot. It fits so well, because this character appears again and again, in all sorts of places in France and in all parts of Valjean’s life.
Life has pushed Thenardier to the margins and he is cheeky and increasingly aggressive enough to reclaim his place at the expense of others.
Together with Dagmar Hellberg’s wonderfully proletarian performance, the result is a first-class delight. For me, this Thenardier is like Gutmann’s Javert: I never want to hear another one!
Madame Thenardier: Dagmar Hellberg
Dagmar Hellberg plays a simple woman who has been forced into this mundane role by life. She is annoyed and frustrated by everything and everyone.
Dagmar Hellberg is a primal force – snappy, sharp, self-confident and wonderfully vulgar. Her voice makes her sound just like how Madame Therandier is: annoying, mouthy, loud, sometimes nagging, sometimes contemptuous. But somehow she always sounds positive. She is also the part of the Thenardier couple that can burst out laughing: vulgar and mischievous.
Köpplinger and the creative team have cast a very perfect couple!
Marius: Florian Peters
I first saw him as a stand-in in St. Gallen and was immediately impressed; now I was able to experience Peters at the premiere in Munich. Florian Peters is probably the Marius who seems the most youthful of all three. The initially rather quiet and serious of the student duo Enjolras and Marius surprises in the love dance with Cosette, where he falls head over heels.
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen anyone look as smiling as Florian Peters does when he looks at his Cosette! He makes your heart beat palpably.
You immediately believe his line in which he sings that Cosette is…
…one burst of light.
Yes, this is exactly what Florian Peters portrays: he is struck to the core, overwhelmed, gripped, „enlightened“. And at this point, I immediately associate Peters‘ performance with Valjean’s line, as he promises Fantine: And I will raise her to the light.
Peters is a spontaneously infatuated, naïve young man. As seriously as he approaches his task on the barricade, so seriously does he fall in love with Cosette.
He is therefore not very sensitive towards Eponine in particular. Tragically, he only understands this when Eponine dies in his arms. He accompanies her to her death with deep sincerity, singing a truly wonderful, harmonious death duet on the barricades.
Enjolras: Merlin Fargel
Enjolras is one of the students who take up arms against the existing social and political conditions.
Such a great role and such a great Merlin Fargel.
Initially acts as a leader, but more as an equal among equals, and does not stand out with his outfit. Possibly they are working against the stereotype of a fanatical leader this time. It’s more about the identity-forming movement of an entire group, which I think makes a lot of sense and moves the whole barricade struggle in the direction of a deep collective desire for change.
But here in Munich, I think he is also a bit more vehement in what he wants and what he demands of others. His way of leading is characterized less by heroism than by a sense of responsibility. He feels a responsibility to change the unequal social conditions of the time. He is not the mindless rebel who enjoys fighting. And yet, although he does not look forward to it joyfully, he is full of expectation: just as Valjean sees his mission in life fulfilled by Cosette, Enjolras sees his mission in life fulfilled by the barricade.
When Eponine collapses, Merlin Fargel’s Enjolras and the group turn away to give Eponine an intimate moment to say goodbye to Marius. His face reflects the difficulty of enduring this cruel encounter with reality.
Yet he consistently follows his path to the end and when he is the last to die on the barricade, I immediately associated this with “A captain abandons the sinking ship last.”
Fantine: Wietske van Tongeren
Wietske van Tongeren is my personal ‚match winner‘ – as far as you can tell in such a great cast!
Fantine is a worker in Valjean’s factory. When her colleagues find out that she has an illegitimate child who is growing up with the family of the innkeepers and for whom she is financially responsible, the entire horde of female workers turns against her and denounces her to the foreman. He then kicks her out. Fantine, who was already living in the poorest of circumstances, becomes completely destitute as a result. But out of devotion to her child, she demands everything of herself: first she sells the last of her possessions, then her hair and finally her body. Although Valjean is able to save her from prison after an altercation with a suitor, Fantine dies emaciated, ill and weakened in hospital, her last thoughts being of her child.
I dreamed a dream, performed by Fantine, is the best-known song from Les Miserables alongside Bring him home. In it, Fantine sings about the dreams of her youth and how real life turned against her and these dreams. It describes a fate for which she is not responsible and which she had to accept. The word “surrendered” comes to mind here. She surrenders to her fate, is only timidly able to stand up to it and only when it comes to her daughter.
Wietske van Tongeren delivers this song so full of loving memories in quiet joy and nostalgia and then modulates her voice from youthful gentleness to the voice of a very realistic woman who knows that life will offer her little chance, that she is on the bad side for good. Fantine is a poor girl, a woman resigned to her fate and a lioness when it comes to her daughter.
As the story progresses, Wietske portrays the character’s physical and psychological decay so mercifully that you get a chill down your spine: first her happiness disappears from her life, and then, as her trust in people fades, so does her confidence. Finally, her physical strength diminishes and you can literally see her increasing demise – like Fantine breaking down in the face of fate. When she fantasizes in her sickbed that her daughter is with her, her awareness of reality increasingly fades, as does the rest of her strength, until finally life as a whole drains away from her.
How subtle Wietske’s acting is, both vocally and physically, is Oscar-worthy. She creates so much empathy in the audience because she lets these stages of decline slide into each other so realistically and authentically. By the end, I have nothing but tears for Fantine.
But when Wietske returns towards the finale, she leaves a deeply satisfied viewer. If she dreamt a dream of love and immortality at the beginning, she appears completely reconciled at the end and accompanies Jean Valjean into eternity, where she is surrounded by the very love and immortality she wished for in her earthly life. Tissue warning!
And then there’s the scene in which Wietske van Tongeren just stands there, doesn’t say anything, just looks:
How Wietske conveys so much devotion, love and kindness through her posture and facial expressions while simply standing still is great art.
Fantine stands by the fading Valjean and observes him. When Cosette and Marius join her, she turns her full attention to this young man, who will be the next to accompany her daughter through life. The kindness she puts on her face!
How Wietske conveys so much devotion, love and kindness through her posture and facial expressions while simply standing still is magnificent work of art.
My deepest gratitude to Wietske for this performance.
Cosette: Julia Sturzlbaum
Cosette lives in a situation where her father is always afraid of being exposed, but she knows nothing about it. She is a shy, introverted, well-behaved woman who falls in love by shock.
Agitated and yet tender, she sings about her first love in an inner monologue with a beautiful soprano! You can tell straight away how something inside her breaks out that has always been there and is now finally allowed to come out: it’s so heart-warming how she snatches the flowers from the hand of the wooing Marius to kiss him! Julia Sturzlbaum’s Cosette really goes all out there. Captivating!
Trivia
In the excellent and extensive program booklet there is a chapter titled „Useless knowledge at the end“, and that’s what you’ll find here in the review:
Daniel Gutman as Javert chases a convict with a tattoo on his chest. In Tootsie, Gutman himself sings while standing on a chair with a tattoo of Dorothy on his chest.
Conclusion
Les Mis is an epic opus and the longest running musical in London’s West End for a reason, and Köpplinger brings this impressive show onto the stage in Munich in such an outstanding production.
Les Mis is huge, rich in detail, emotional, demanding, and all of this at once, and because of this complexity it is not a sure-fire success, as all these facets have to be handled.
Among the many truly brilliant shows that the Gärtnerplatztheater has staged (Priscilla, Tootsie, Drei Männer im Schnee, …), this production is in another league.
The production impresses with its deep emotionality, which is brilliantly conveyed both vocally and dramatically by the ensemble, cast fabulously down to the last role. Led by two outstanding Valjeans Armin Kahl and Filippo Strocchi, an unparalleled Javert Daniel Gutmann, a heartbreaking Fantine – Wietske van Tongeren and completed by Alexander Franzen’s stunning Thenardier.
Justifiably sold out on all dates, Köpplinger’s Les Miserables is a highlight that is second to none in the German-speaking world. With this ensemble, every note is a delight, every scene a painting: the quality of this high-end production is sure to remain unrivaled for years to come.
Curtain call photos: Julia Stöhr-Schlosser, stage photos: Dr. Joachim Schlosser. Translation: Dr. Joachim Schlosser with DeepL.com assistance.
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