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The Waldmeister Cure for Moral Rigidity München
Staatstheater am Gärtnerplatz
07/09/2026 - & July 11*, 17, 18, 2026
Johann Strauss Jr : Waldmeister
Sophia Keller (Pauline Garlandt), Daniel Gutmann*/Ludwig Mittelhammer (Chief Forester Tymeon Gerius), Daniel Prohaska (Erasmus Friedrich Müller), Anna‑Katherina Tonauer (Jeanne), Matteo Ivan Rasic (Botho Wendt), Andreja Zidaric*/Ilia Staple (Freda), Regina Schörg (Malvine Heffele), Robert Meyer (Christof Heffele), Caspar Krieger (City Councillor Danner), Erwin Windegger (Martin the caretaker, Sebastian the butler), Alexander Findewirth (Erich), Riccarda Schönerstedt (Regina)
Chor des Staatstheaters am Gärtnerplatz, Pietro Numico (chorus master), Orchester des Staatstheaters am Gärtnerplatz, Michael Brandstätter (conductor)
Josef E. Köpplinger (stage director, lights), Walter Vogelweider (sets), Uta Meenen (costumes), Peter Hörtner (lights), Ricarda Regina Ludigkeit (co‑director, choreography), Karin Bohnert (dramaturgy)
(© Marie-Laure Briane)
Among the many injustices of operatic history is the neglect that has befallen Johann Strauss’s Waldmeister. Premiered at the Theater an der Wien in December 1895, the composer’s penultimate operetta has long remained in the shadow of its more illustrious siblings, its inspired score burdened by a libretto of conspicuous fragility. Yet the Gärtnerplatztheater’s new production, mounted last season in celebration of Strauss’s bicentenary and presently reprised, makes a persuasive case that even this most problematic of works can, in sufficiently intelligent hands, reveal unexpected charms.
The action unfolds beneath the lingering pall of the post‑war years, that peculiar atmosphere of outward propriety and latent yearning which so perfectly suits operetta. A party of forestry students, setting off on a seemingly innocent bicycle excursion into the countryside, is overtaken by a violent storm. Together with the celebrated singer Pauline Garlandt and her secretary Jeanne, they seek shelter in the as‑yet unopened inn Zur Waldmühle, where necessity—and theatrical convention—compels them to exchange their sodden garments for the pristine livery intended for the establishment’s staff.
Into this already precarious situation enters the severe Chief Forester Tymoleon Gerius, betrothed to the lovely Freda and intent upon apprehending his errant students. Instead, he encounters Pauline, whom he promptly mistakes for the miller’s wife, thereby setting in motion a series of increasingly elaborate misunderstandings. Meanwhile, the young Botho, hopelessly enamoured of Freda, seeks to frustrate her impending marriage with the assistance of the eccentric botanist Professor Erasmus Friedrich Müller, who has arrived to investigate the alleged discovery of a rare black woodruff by Freda’s mother, the formidable amateur savante Malvine.
The professor instantly perceives that the botanical marvel is nothing more than ordinary woodruff stained with ink. Yet, once transformed into a generously fortified punch, this harmless fraud acquires properties of a far more potent nature. Inhibitions dissolve, social hierarchies are suspended, and a distinctly Bacchic spirit descends upon the proceedings. One by one, the village dignitaries—including District Administrator Heffele and Councillor Danner—succumb to the intoxicating brew and join the general revelry.
By the following morning, the enchanted potion has accomplished what only operetta can accomplish with such cheerful implausibility: confusions are dispelled, affections properly ordered, and the requisite couples united in accordance with the moral imperatives of the age. It is, to be sure, a plot of exquisite inconsequence, yet one that provides Strauss with a perfect pretext for some of his most effervescent and beguiling music.
Josef E. Köpplinger approaches the piece not as an antiquarian curiosity but as living theatre. Dispensing with the original Saxon milieu, he transplants the action to Vienna in the 1950s and, in so doing, discovers precisely the social landscape in which Waldmeister may flourish. The post‑war world he evokes is one of immaculate appearances and suppressed desires, of provincial propriety straining against the first stirrings of emancipation. Such an environment proves singularly apt for a work in which identities are exchanged, inhibitions dissolved, and social hierarchies rendered deliciously unstable by the agency of an intoxicating punch.
The production possesses that increasingly rare quality in operetta: it trusts both the intelligence of its audience and the innate sophistication of the genre itself. Köpplinger allows the comedy to unfold with unfailing theatrical instinct, while permitting beneath its froth a gentle current of social observation. Discreet allusions to sexual liberation and queer identities are integrated with tact and wit, never imposed upon the work but rather emerging organically from its spirit of carnival and transgression. The result is an evening of uncommon elegance, in which exuberance and refinement coexist in perfect equilibrium.
Walter Vogelweider’s sets evoke the idealised visual language of post‑war Heimat cinema with affectionate precision, while Uta Meenen’s costumes capture the period’s sartorial proprieties only to delight in their gradual undoing. Ricarda Regina Ludigkeit’s choreography lends the proceedings additional vivacity, and the chorus, splendidly prepared by Pietro Numico, contributes a fullness of sound and a theatrical alertness that are indispensable to the evening’s success.
The cast is uniformly distinguished. Sophia Keiler, who was a delightful Juliette Vermont in Der Graf von Luxemburg a couple of weeks earlier, proves an ideal Pauline Garlandt, her radiant lyric soprano allied to a stage presence of irresistible charm and effortless authority. She possesses that increasingly rare gift of making operetta appear entirely natural, as though speech and song were merely two manifestations of the same impulse. The versatile Daniel Prohaska, who was Macheath in Die Dreigroschenoper last week and the Count in the aforementioned Lehár operetta, played Professor Erasmus Friedrich Müller as a comic creation of genuine distinction, sung with refinement and acted with exquisitely judged eccentricity. In the space of two weeks, Prohaska excelled in portraying a charmer, a menacing kingpin and a comic eccentric professor. Daniel Gutmann lends Tymoleon Gerius a firm, handsome baritone and an appealing blend of pomposity and vulnerability.
Slovenian soprano Andreja Zidaric, who portrayed Angèle Didier in Der Graf von Luxemburg, was a touching and warm Freda, while Anna‑Katharina Tonauer brings vocal poise and finely calibrated comic instincts to Jeanne. Croatian tenor Matteo Ivan Rasic, in the punishingly high‑lying role of Botho, dispatches his formidable vocal demands with admirable security and brilliance. Robert Meyer, with consummate theatrical intelligence, offers a masterclass in character comedy as District Administrator Heffele, splendidly matched by Austrian soprano Regina Schörg’s deliciously severe Malvine. Schörg, who sang Donna Anna in Don Giovanni in Paris and Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail in Vienna, over twenty years ago, still possesses a galvanising stage presence and an appealing voice. Erwin Windegger, endowed with a natural verve, provides moments of irresistible comic invention as brothers Martin and Sebastian, while the supporting cast contributes to an exemplary sense of ensemble.
Yet it is in the pit that the evening ultimately finds its centre of gravity. Michael Brandstätter conducts with an understanding of Strauss that transcends mere stylistic accomplishment and approaches genuine idiomatic authority. His reading is notable for its elegance, rhythmic suppleness and unforced Viennese inflection. The music breathes naturally; nothing is exaggerated, nothing underlined. Waltzes unfold with graceful inevitability, ensembles sparkle with wit, and moments of nostalgia emerge with all the poignancy that Strauss’s late style can summon.
Particularly admirable is Brandstätter’s scholarly devotion to the score itself, having meticulously collated the performing materials with the composer’s autograph manuscript. Such fidelity, however, never descends into pedantry. On the contrary, it serves only to liberate the music’s extraordinary freshness and sophistication. The Orchestra of the Staatstheater am Gärtnerplatz responds magnificently, playing with refinement, transparency and infectious élan. Even the unforeseen reduction of orchestral forces in the third act failed to diminish the performance’s musical integrity. The extended postlude, beautifully sustained, seemed almost reluctant to relinquish its audience, allowing Strauss’s enchantment to linger long after the final curtain.
No amount of theatrical ingenuity can entirely disguise the essential inconsequence of Waldmeister’s libretto, and it is unlikely that the work will ever challenge the supremacy of Die Fledermaus, Eine Nacht in Venedig or Der Zigeunerbaron. Yet such considerations become almost irrelevant in the face of a performance of this calibre. Through intelligent staging, superb ensemble singing and conducting of exceptional distinction, the Gärtnerplatztheater has demonstrated that even a minor Strauss operetta can, for an evening at least, assume the stature of a major event.
One left the theatre not merely entertained but reminded of an enduring truth: in operetta, as in life, a little intoxication can occasionally produce the happiest of resolutions.
Ossama el Naggar
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