In this place, in “Hall No. 600” of the Nuremberg Palace of Justice, a middle-aged actor tells the public how a couple of years ago he piled stones in the garage of a cast-iron portrait of Hitler, found among the things of his great-grandmother.
The duet of directors dura & kroesinger, known in Germany and abroad as adherents of documentary theater, staged a play in Nuremberg called “Hall 600: In Search of Traces”. And they did it not just anywhere, but in the very place in the Palace of Justice, where 75 years ago the main Nazi criminals were convicted (not all, as we know, but those who could).
The same hall
The spectators were placed where 75 years ago the journalists of the world’s leading publications were sitting, who followed the processes in Nuremberg. At that time, the attention of the entire planet was riveted to this Bavarian city. The performance, which premiered at the end of September, was based on minutes and notes, excerpts from newspaper articles, personal stories of the actors. Naturally, within the framework of an hour and a half performance, it is impossible to work through kilometers of documentary films and tons of testimonies. I had to choose. The choice fell on several key figures. In the performance of five actors, they replace each other. Original lyrics are played.
The Third Reich: Perpetrator and Victim
The prosecution’s questions were answered by Otto Ohlendorf, SS Gruppenfuehrer, commander of Einsatzgroup D. The calmness with which he spoke about the massacres of civilians in the occupied territories is striking. This man quite sincerely sympathized … with his subordinates, who were “forced” to beat people with rifle butts so that they would calm down and did not interfere with the executions. He worried about the “peace of mind” of the German officers, who needed to rest after several hours of “work”.
In 1946, Ohlendorf was not sentenced. A year later, he became one of the main defendants in a separate Einsatzgruppen trial. And as a result of that trial on April 10, 1948, he was sentenced to death by hanging.
Marie-Claude Vaillant-Couturier also performed in front of the audience. During the occupation of France, she took part in Resistance actions, was arrested by the Vichy police in 1942, handed over to the Gestapo, after which she was placed in the Auschwitz concentration camp, and then transferred to the Ravensbrück camp, where she remained until the end of the war. Marie Claude Vaillant-Couturier spoke about life and death in the camp. On the basis of what signs it was immediately possible to understand who would be sent to the gas chamber today. About whom the Nazis scoffed at with particular sophistication. The testimonies of the woman who survived in the death camp became invaluable proof of the guilt of the defendants.
Scene from the play “Hall No. 600”
The verdicts were passed, but the end was not put
Towards the end of the performance, the actors, as was expected, acted as a tribunal and announced the verdicts. Hermann Goering, Martin Bormann (in absentia), Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Rosenberg, Hans Frank, Wilhelm Frick, Julius Streicher, Fritz Sauckel, Inkvod Seyss-
But the production did not end there. Together with the actors, the audience finds themselves in 1951 near the Landsberg prison – in the Bavarian city of Landsberg am Lech. After the war, it was renamed War Criminals Prison No. 1. It housed convicted Nazis. After the sentences were passed, many people asked to spare the criminals, in particular – the deputies of the Bundestag. In 1951, a rally was held in Landsberg in defense of the Nazi prisoners. Several thousand people came. The rally ended in a scandal, because a counter-demonstration in memory of the victims was taking place in parallel. According to eyewitnesses, the sympathy of the population was completely on the side of the criminals, while the victims of National Socialism were not guarded by anyone … And at some point the crowd roared: “Jews, get out!”
Hitler could not be locked
The actors tell their personal stories. Someone found a picture of my grandmother among family photographs – in a cradle against a wall with a portrait of Hitler. And someone’s great-grandmother, a fan of Hitler, kept in an oak chest “Mein Kampf” and a cast-iron panel depicting the “Fuhrer”. The great-grandmother’s descendants decided to hide the chest in the garage, filling them with stones: “We locked Hitler so that he could never get out.” But recently, in August of this year, an actor talking about a great-grandmother with a cast-iron Hitler pulled out a chest from under a pile of stones and opened it … And this is the end of the performance.
See also:
.