Article: The Theatre Backpacker (www.theatreartlife.com)

OBERAMMERGAU PASSIONSSPIELE: EXPLORING A SACRED THEATRE

By Jack Paterson | Part 7 of 10
Originally published February 3, 2024 at www.theatreartlife.com
Original Article Link: Exploring a Sacred Theatre – Part 7 (theatreartlife.com)

OBSERVING REHEARSALS – DAY 2: FACING THE PAST

Date: April 2022
Location: Oberammergau, Germany
Activity: Rehearsals

It’s 8 pm.

On stage, a Roman soldier pushes a crown of thorns down on his head and Jesus falls to his knees.

Then there’s a flurry of activity at the theatre entrance doors and the audience risers fill with people of all ages. Is this the doubled artists? Or more locals coming to watch rehearsals after work? As the scene continues, Stückl turns to the bleachers, says something in German into his microphone, and they all vanish.

And just as suddenly the masses appear again through the upstage entrances. There must be at least a couple hundred people on the stage. The leading roles are in costume, everyone else is in winter boots, jackets, and hats. 3 quarters of the huge stage is full of people.

We stop for a moment, and I take this opportunity to slip outside. The cast and crew have been working with out breaks with individuals finding moments in the natural rhythms of the group. More people are arriving outside, and I can only image they are joining those already on the stage.

Back inside, the director has clambered onto a raised platform stage right. With a microphone in one hand and a script in the other, flanked by the actors playing Roman generals and authorities, he leads the masses through the scene. Through the combined voices of several hundred people, the threat of mob violence is palpable.

Roman soldiers arrive and push back the mob of Jerusalem with their shields like riot police. The director walks down the steps of the stage with that director smile of glee I recognize and have seen so often in others, before turning around and running back up on stage to rejoin his cast.

The long dark grey-blue coats of the Romans, along with the casual brutality of the guards, can’t help conjuring up the Nazis. Later, the green-brown breast plates and short sleeved shirts of the soldiers suggest contemporary soldiers.

With the challenging history of passion plays in general, this one in particular, and the contemporary history of the region, Oberammergau doesn’t hide from its past. Nor does it hide from its responsibilities as a model other passion play productions look to, to its history, and to the future.

This, however, did not happen overnight.

With internal and external pressures from traditionalist and progressive camps, it would take several decades following World War 2 for the community council to begin addressing the anti-Semitic tendencies of passion plays dating back to the middle-ages.

When awarding Stückl with the American Jewish Committee Isaiah Award, AJC’s highest award for interreligious leadership, Rabbi Marans said Stückl

“…demonstrated the power of one individual to make a tremendous difference. He took a play that was sadly infamous for its hundreds of years of antisemitic tropes and visuals and transformed it, creating an educational tool for post-Shoah Christian and German self-reflection…Stückl has shepherded the Oberammergau community into a new era for the play that acknowledges its problematic past and labors continuously for a very good present and an even better future.”

Over four productions and four decades, Stückl has reimagined the production in consultation with groups such as the AJC, and teams of interfaith, historical, and spiritual experts. As part of their preparation and research, the lead performers and the design team go on a pilgrimage to Israel where they meet with religious and secular scholars and teachers. This year they were joined by a team of five theologians and rabbis on site.

He highlights that Jesus and his followers were Jewish themselves. He places the story of Jesus’ last 5 days in historical context with the intra-faith tensions of the region and period, and Roman occupation – making it clear only Pontius Pilate could condemn Jesus to death.

The male actors all wear yarmulkes, identifying their characters’ heritages. Mary is greeted with “How lucky we are to have our rabbi’s mother join us!”. During the scene of the Last Supper, a Menorah is lit and Jesus and his disciples recite prayers in Hebrew alongside the Christian Lord’s Prayer. In a now favorite scene, Jesus raises the Torah to hundreds singing a central Jewish prayer, Sh’ma Yisrael.

The Passionsspiele Theatre’s history with the Third Reich is addressed on the wall dedicated to the production’s history and in all the souvenir books. Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels attended the Oberammergau Passionsspiele Play during its 300th year anniversary season. Like throughout much of Germany, these reminders of their Nazi past are there to help ensure it never happens again.

When receiving his award, Stückl said, “Let there be no doubt: in Oberammergau, in the play, antisemitism has no place, and it has no place in the lives of the performers either…this award is a reminder that we have not reached an end to our work.”

Links & Resources:
A Rabbi’s Impressions of the Oberammergau Passion Play, by Joseph Krauskopf [1901]
https://sacred-texts.com/jud/rio/rio03.htm

How Hitler’s Favorite Passion Play Lost Its Anti-Semitism by A.J. Goldman (The Atlantic, August 4, 2022)
https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2022/08/oberammergau-passion-play-german-jewish-history/671026/

Meet the director removing anti-Semitism from Oberammergau’s famous Passion play by Andrew Faiz (Broadview Magazine, March 23, 2021)
https://broadview.org/oberammergau-passion-play/

Oberaumagau Passionsspeile:
https://www.passionsspiele-oberammergau.de/en/home

Oberammergau Passion Play Director Christian Stückl Receives American Jewish Committee Isaiah Award (AJC News, August 10, 2022)
https://www.ajc.org/news/oberammergau-passion-play-director-christian-stuckl-receives-american-jewish-committee-isaiah

Images:
1. Oberammergau Passion Play 2022: The Last Supper – Photo Birgit Gudjonsdottir
2. Oberammergau Passion Play 2022: Jesus before Pilate – Photo Birgit Gudjonsdottir
3. Oberammergau Passion Play 2022: Jesus and Mary Magdalene – Photo Arno Declair
4. Oberammergau Passion Play 2022: The Last Supper and the cup – Photo Birgit Gudjonsdottir
5. Oberammergau Passion Play 2022: Schmah Israel – Photo Arno Declair