This episode is not a great success in the fight against anti-Semitism
All or nothing: Wajdi Mouawad
Which: AFP/STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN
In autumn 2022, the play “Vögel” was canceled after allegations of anti-Semitism. Now it should be played again, but an order from its author thwarts the plans of the Munich Metropoltheater. It is not only art, which is increasingly under pressure, that suffers damage.
Dhe debate about the play “Birds” has taken a new turn: the planned revival at the Munich Metropoltheater has been cancelled. Author Wajdi Mouawad has instructed his agency that the text would have to be shown verbatim for a performance in Munich so that the play “is not further damaged by unjustified allegations of anti-Semitism and a heated debate in Munich”. Such strict requirements are unusual. However, an unabridged performance would be equivalent to the expense of a new production, the theater said – and will take the play off the schedule again, as it did in the fall.
The message from the theater sounds like you’ve been caught off guard. And it also sounds as if Mouawad had more confidence in his text than the Munich production. One can understand the author who, in such a situation, insists that the public take note of the work in its entirety. But it would have been important for this public to be able to see the Munich production, it is the first and only one of the play that was accused of anti-Semitism. A consequence of these allegations was that the theater had made minor changes for the revival, that too is now obsolete.
Now who has the damage? The author who fears for his play and its reputation? The theater that takes the production off the schedule for the second time? The public, which cannot form its own picture of the subject of the scandal? In retrospect, it was particularly detrimental that the allegations of the Jewish student associations were argumentatively shaky, but this was made up for by rigorous demands for the withdrawal of subsidies for the theater. Even more fatal was the fact that there were enough Munich and Bavarian politicians who immediately jumped on it without forming a well-founded judgment on the matter.
Art increasingly under pressure
The Metropoltheater defended itself by removing “Birds” from the schedule. It is bitterly ironic that this is now being repeated. While “Vögel” will continue to be played in Berlin, Hamburg or Lüneburg – even with cuts. But the dispute in Munich is different due to the scandal. The author wants to prove there that his piece is a complex work of art, quite different from the Taring Padi agitprop at the Documenta, which deals easily with anti-Semitism. The theater also wants to prove that its own production has nothing to do with it. Apparently, both at the same time are not possible, so the taking of evidence is aborted without result.
It would probably have been better to present both the staging and the entire play plus an accompanying program of discussions and lectures. In order to publicly deal with the unbroken danger of anti-Semitism and the increasingly oppressed peculiarities of art. Despite the canceled resumption, such a discussion should be held in Munich, not only the theater has a duty here. Because the Munich episode cannot be considered a great success in the fight against anti-Semitism.