German premièr

»Autumn crocus« – it is a plant that heals as well as poisons. The good and the bad cannot be clearly separated from each other. Gunther, pastor of a small rural community, believes unshakably in the good of humanity and has dedicated himself to the rehabilitation of »problem citizens«. These are the fat alcoholic Wolfgang, the neo-Nazi Björn, the hot-tempered foreigner Hashem and the pregnant Iris. Gunther’s mercy soon reveals itself to be obsession that tolerates no contradiction.

The piece is based on the Danish film »Adams æbler« (»Adam’s Apples«) by Anders Thomas Jensen, 2005, and the nonfiction book »Beyond Good and Evil – Why we are better people without morals« by Michael Schmidt-Salomon, 2009. The Swiss director Dirk Vittinghoff, born in 1960 in Mülheim an der Ruhr, stages humorously and darkly different forms of faith. Questions regarding existence, suffering, virtue and morality function as a light comedy and dark tragedy at the same time. The mixture of actor theatre and puppet theatre creates a special, suspended form of performance.

Armin Kopp, born in 1959 in Graz, and Philippe Nauer, born in 1966 in Zurich, are amongst the most well-known actors of the free Swiss theatre scene. Philippe Nauer participated in the euro-scene Leipzig 2003 as actor in »Torrance & Grady« by the company vroom, Zurich.

»Philippe Nauer and Armin Kopp have successfully found the magic of being believable both as the pastor and as the neo-Nazi while making the puppets Hashem and Wolfgang simultaneously frighteningly alive. This contrast makes a human being become visible: more fragile and endangered than one would like to admit« (Kaa Linder, Swiss Radio DRS 2, Basel, 13.12.2012).