Leonce und Lena

Two royal children on the run. They reject what the world has planned for them. "What do you want from me? Prepare me for my profession?" Leonce doesn't want to become a king, nor a scientist, hero, or artist - and definitely not a useful member of society: "My life yawns at me, like a big white sheet of paper that I'm supposed to write all over, but I can't bring out a letter." Lena, too, wants to determine for herself, flees in bridal finery from the arranged marriage, the unknown groom: "Why drive a nail through two hands that did not seek each other?" And an old king no longer wants and can do nothing. He is in the greatest confusion and would like nothing better than to relinquish power, to hand over his responsibility for a people he simply cannot remember (despite the knot in his handkerchief). The story of Leonce and Lena is quickly brought to a close: While on the run, the wayward royal children meet and fall in love, return home masked, and are married as automatons instead of the untraceable couple. When the masks fall, they have to realize that what they had foreseen has come true: "That was the escape to paradise. I am deceived."

With this work, Nora Schlocker returns to the Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus, where she worked as house director from 2011 to 2014. With 15 young people and an old king, she will rediscover the eerie comedy by the 22-year-old Büchner full of playfulness and world-weariness. What happens in the encounter with an adult audience? Does the provocative lack of support of the young ensemble challenge us or does it attract us? Should we be afraid for this youth or of its nihilism?