Theater meeting: “Bucket List”: An evening at the theater as a rescue

After the applause, the author Carolin Emcke comes on stage. She has been invited by the theater meeting to give a keynote speech and an outside look at the musical »Bucket List« by Yael Ronen and Shlomi Shaban. But she doesn’t want to say much, but rather personal things. When she saw the work in December, she was shaken out of an emotional paralysis and numbness. She was finally able to feel something again – after the Hamas attack on October 7th. An evening at the theater as a rescue.

And today? Emcke admits that he had concerns about attending another performance. But what did she see? She saw herself in December. Back then, when Ronen and Shaban pulled her out of her emotional state, she would not have believed that the Israeli hostages would still not be freed after six months, nor that such suffering would come to Gaza.

It sounds as if “Bucket List” was an explicitly political evening. And that’s what he is, but at the same time not at all. It tells the story of a man named Richard who wakes up on a Saturday and the world is no longer the same as before. He feels strangely alien and doesn’t know why. Damian Rebgetz, usually booked for cheerful roles by Ronen and others, plays Richard with gentle melancholy. He often just stands at the edge of the stage and sadly watches what is happening. What happened to him? Has he changed or has the world changed? Maybe both are true. This Saturday could be October 7th. And it could also be the day on which Richard used medicine to arm himself against memories like those of the massacre.

At the beginning of the 75-minute performance, the other players Ruth Rosenfeld, Carolin Haupt and Christopher Nell swarm around him and explain to him, singing, that he has finally freed himself from his traumas. Of course at the price of all his other memories. Happiness, security, freedom – that was the message of the evening – are only possible if you live in the pure here and now, if your view of the horrible past is blocked. Richard is now like Buddha, living only in the pure present. If only it were like that! Maybe then this musical could actually be a comedy. But the side effect of the treatment is memory fragments that drill into the hearts of Richard and the audience.

White items of clothing keep falling off the laces. The ensemble carries them around, collects them, puts baby onesies on the stage floor. Video projections are running in the background; the images are unclear, but sometimes you think you can see lightning and explosions. A performance by guitarist Thomas Moked Blum is even more explicit. Together with Amir Bresler on drums and Hila Kulik on piano, he forms the wonderful live band of the evening. In the scene in question, he steps up to the microphone himself and slips into the role of a journalist who is just about to celebrate a party when he receives an order: He is supposed to report on the attack on a village; there was a terrible bloodbath.

Such direct references to October 7th sit alongside lighter scenes. It’s about a couple who fall apart out of jealousy, about grief and the ownership of memories. Richard enjoys a carefree beer when suddenly “Reality” calls and wants to pull him back to himself, i.e. into reality. Ronen staged the scene like a phone call between two ex-partners. Yes, “Bucket List” is definitely a funny, often sad and yet clever evening. And yet there is something missing. The depth that Emcke and with her many viewers and critics recognized in this production when it came out in December can only be imagined. Instead, you can clearly see the aging process in what is happening on stage. Exhibiting one’s own sadness and helplessness in the face of horror no longer has any meaningful value on this Thursday in May. What remains is highly entertaining and painful helplessness.

Next performances: May 10th and 12th.