Coming of Age Theatre in Hanover: Instructions for Inactivity

Sounds like Disney, but looks different: With Bonn Park’s “Bambi and the Themes”, the Theater an der Glocksee delves into the emotional chaos of digital teens.

Being together without having to talk to each other is very important for the young generation Photo: Leona Ohsiek/ThadG

The Theater an der Glocksee in Hanover is being transformed into Dinosaur City today: the home of Bambi, Blume and Thumper. The three, known from the Disney film, are wearing costumes that are more reminiscent of a Berlin shared flat than of a cloven-hoofed animal, a skunk and a rabbit. Nevertheless, there are still signs of their cartoon existence, such as a painted deer nose.

They sit on a pole frame and are enveloped in warm light. They kiss, kiss and talk about their utopia. They met each other during Bambi’s first, clumsy steps through the meadow. They helped him to find his way in his new world.

According to the accompanying booklet, all mammals are humans, so sooner or later they were given a cell phone. Between Tiktok dances and the apocalypse, the piece “Bambi and the Themes” always comes back to the first wish that the deer expresses: “I want to live a good life.”

The Berlin playwright Bonn Park, born in 1987, tells a coming-of-age story with “Bambi and the Topics”. Bambi and his friends carry all the questions, topics and opinions in their hearts and cling to each other while they are overwhelmed by the flood of information. The stage is divided into two rooms.

The mobile phone is a world of its own

The first represents the outside world. Usually a three-person shared apartment, but sometimes a sporting event or a flower meadow. The second room, on the left of the stage, is the inside of a giant cell phone. Where the screen would normally be, there is a transparent curtain. It serves as a projection surface, but also allows access to the digital interior of the cell phone.

A live camera captures the faces of the players and lets an AI interpretation of the recording flicker over the pure image. Fictional horror images of dinosaur city replace real horror images of war and environmental disasters. This mixture of comic fiction and real horror fits the widespread online mood: “The world is ending, but luckily we have memes.”

The gang is always accompanied by two men in white suits who are clearly male. One of them is the narrator, who dictates or comments on the actions. The second is referred to in the cast list as “???/Mighty Dinosaur”. Sometimes he hosts a game show about the trolley problem, sometimes he appears as a Santa Claus/God/Jesus figure from his cell phone and messes everything up.

The dialogues between Bambi, Blume and Thumper initially seem strange and more like they were written by a narrator than said by the characters. The fear that the play would end up being one of those portrayals that condescendingly portray young people as smartphone zombies constantly triggered by something or other turns out to be unfounded: Over time, the insider and authentic youth language creates the feeling of being on the same wavelength as the characters.

Although existential crises are sometimes told sarcastically and with a lot of humor, Jonas Vietzke’s production clearly takes Bambi’s dissatisfaction, Blume’s despair and Klopfer’s disorientation seriously as real problems.

So in the middle of the play, Bambi is asked in the line for beer and sausages at a sporting event whether he is a boy or a girl. Because if the deer were a girl, the ???/Mighty Dinosaur would like to ask him out on a date. If he were a boy, he wouldn’t. Or would he? No. Or would he?

And so the question goes back and forth as to whether he could hit on Bambi without appearing gay. By repeating this question over and over again and by the Mighty Dinosaur addressing the audience with it, it becomes clear how intrusive it can seem: addressing non-binary issues with an animal that is also a human works well, perhaps also because we are more willing to see a deer as a gender-neutral being.

During fits of rage, new beginnings and great despair, Larissa Potapov and Nina Melcher as Bambi and flower scenes support the audience with dance elements. Tommy Wiesner as Thumper sings quietly about peace and loudly about the inability to change the course of events.

These moments without the flow of words are a welcome break from the chaos of other topics. It ended with the decision not to change anything. Because it’s not really about what’s happening around us. We can always start again: It’s about our attitude and the people who give us support.