Chapter 5
Up until late 1944 the German theatres in occupied Europe were deemed to be operating at the front line of an aggressive Germanification of whole regions. In the end, however, and despite the vast amounts of money poured into these ventures, the German theatres ceased operation one by one ahead of the advancing Allied armies, and companies were moved back to the Altreich. It is worth noting, though, that for most practitioners the officially decreed closure of all theatres on 1 September 1944 did not represent the end of their endeavours. They regarded this as neither a prelude to Germany’s capitulation nor the end of their theatres. Right up to the end of the war many believed that the current closure was just temporary and that they would re-open in due course, as conversations and planning for future seasons continued. After all the investment and effort, surely these German theatres had been built to last.
Despite efforts not to let theatre be affected by the war, it increasingly impinged on the day-to-day operation of playhouses from 1942 onwards. In contrast to theatres in the Altreich, the German language theatres in the occupied territories had been founded under challenging conditions and at a time when raw materials were already in short supply. Further along, air raids became a more permanent fixture in some areas, employees were called up or already dead, and replacements were increasingly difficult to find, and the fear of the advancing Red Army was a very real threat. Following the 1944 Soviet summer offensive millions fled westwards, many of them in a rush and leaving almost everything they owned behind. Still, theatres continued to perform, in both senses of the word, until they were forced to shut down in September 1944. During the 1941/2 season alone the Posen theatre, for example, presented 14 special celebratory performances (Festvorstellungen), mostly in honour of leading politicians or in relation to specific dates in the Nazi festive calendar.1 Even amid an increasingly desperate military situation every effort was made to continue staging lavish operas and revive the great classics. Many theatres in the occupied territories went on tours, and even a burnt out workshop or costume department did not deter them.
Still, in line with society at large, the theatres were affected by the regime becoming increasingly nervous and draconian in its measures. The artistic director of the travelling company Landesbühne Gau Wartheland, Hans Rainer, for example, reported in December 1943 that one of his directors, Hans Herzog, had been arrested by the Gestapo for “wearing a fake uniform complete with medals”.2 In March 1944 three female members of the dance ensemble at the Prague German Opera House (one of them German, the other two Czech) were caught smoking during a sold out performance. At the time they were in the auditorium (in a box), and they were smoking “openly and noticeably”. The verdict was that instead of being reprimanded, they were being made redundant with immediate effect.3 In another case from January 1945, Czech actor Karl Prinz (Karl Smejkal) was sacked after he had been convicted of a Kriegswirtschaftsverbrechen (literally, crimes against the wartime economy) (he probably stole something, although the file does not say), for which he received a four month prison sentence.4
Wartime pressures on staff and materials did not mean, therefore, that protocol was not keenly followed anymore; on the contrary. The regime was so obsessed with professional standards that even as the war went on strict policies on the necessary standard for theatrical productions, “appropriate” behaviour in public and bureaucratic procedures remained in place. When Krakau’s artistic director Max Krüger asked the Reich Theatre Chamber in March 1944 whether he could employ a directing assistant (Regieassistentin) who had had acting classes for some time and was an art history student, this was flatly denied. Within four days Krüger had a reply from Herr Bergen, who reminded him of regulation no. 38 (“at least two year’s apprenticeship as an actress, one year of which had to be as a directing student. The subsequent training then consisted of a two year directing candidacy at an established theatre”). A further reply would have been futile; the letter of the law was still being followed in the spring of 1944.5 In a similar case, the artistic director of the theatre in Marburg, Robert Falzari, asked whether he could employ the actor Fritz Robert although he was not a paid up member of the Reich Theatre Chamber. Rolf Roenneke at the Theatre Chamber refused despite the fact that Marburg was evidently struggling to attract sufficiently qualified actors. What is particularly interesting about this exchange of letters, however, is Falzari’s ignorance. There was no attempt to hide that Robert not only lacked the necessary membership (which Falzari must have known was a prerequisite to work in the theatre industry) since 1933 but, in fact, “refused this accreditation”.6
The closure of all places of entertainment at the end of August 1944 took many theatres by surprise. Throughout June 1944 artistic director Johannes Maurach at Danzig was looking to strengthen his cast for the upcoming 1944/5 season and enlisted the help of the Reich Theatre Chamber to support the difficult search.7 The touring ensemble of the Landesbühne Danzig Marienburg in April 1944 was desperately looking for new members, too.8 After a successful week of premieres in June 1944 the Thorn theatre was busy planning for the new season.9 In Prague Oskar Walleck’s successor, Kinner von Dressler, got to work in summer 1944 and was busy planning for the new season, including working on new contracts and plans for new productions. The Hague theatre presented Albert Lortzing’s opera Tsar and Carpenter in a new production on 14 June 1944, announced the premiere of a new adaptation of Sophocles’ Antigone and performed – as the last performance of the season – Wagner’s Flying Dutchman. A press release announced that these three productions would also be taken over into the 1944/5 season.10 The small theatre in Graudenz in mid-August 1944 started with the rehearsals for the upcoming season.11 In May 1944 the Lille company had been moved to the Belgian town of Spa, but despite the Allied landings in Normandy a short while later, preparations for the 1944/5 season began. Lille’s opera company was ordered to reassemble in Straßburg in July, and small productions took place throughout the summer in a number of Belgian towns and cities.12 In Krakau, after an initial panic due to the surprising speed of the Russian advance in the summer of 1944, the theatre returned to normal. In July 1944 evacuations had started with a number of train wagons carrying “valuable properties and costumes” west to Görlitz, and some actors had left, too, only to be recalled at the beginning of August to start rehearsing Kleist’s Prince of Homburg, the premiere of which was planned for 2 September. Then, eventually, the theatre did close a few weeks later because of the declaration of “total war”, and the evacuation started for real – at least for the female members of the cast.13 The considerable correspondence in the relevant files testifies to the fact that a lot of energy and money had already gone into planning for the 1944/5 season at all theatres under investigation here when Goebbels announced the closure of all theatres. In fact, even after that date the protagonists expected this closure to be temporary, as planning continued right up to March 1945.14
The regime’s central administration itself was keen to be seen as supporting the arts after September 1944. As late as January 1945 artistic directors discussed personnel issues, contractual matters and other queries with their superiors at the Reich Theatre Chamber – in preparation for their theatres’ re-opening after the “final victory”. For example, the Deutsches Theater in Lille in early 1945 checked with the Reich Theatre Chamber whether it would be legitimate to employ a lighting technician who had gained his qualification before 1934, prior to the new uniform regulations. After a few letters had been exchanged Berlin agreed to his appointment on 29 January 1945.15 Even after theatres had been closed, all former employees continued to receive their salaries, with benefits and all contractual agreements remaining in place.16 Not all of them, however, acted with the necessary decorum – or at least this is what former general director Maurach (Danzig) felt in December 1944. He checked with the Reich Theatre Chamber’s Rolf Roenneke, and both agreed that Maurach still remained in charge and exercised control over his former employees – although the theatre had closed and they were largely gone. Establishment figures such as Maurach and Roenneke feared actors might do small time (tingeln) acting in cheap farces and horseplay (Schmiere) – a major concern at the end of the war, or so this detailed exchange of letters suggests. In the end, order and control needed to be re-established, and the leader (Führer) of each theatrical institution needed to be relied upon.17 Even at this late stage of the war appearances were still kept up and administrative processes keenly followed.
Another case from late 1944 further illustrates that the Nazi administration on various levels was keen to show – internally as well as externally – that their support for the theatre was not just lip service but integral to the regime’s duties, even after the closure of all theatres – or perhaps even more so now than before. In a manner not dissimilar to the competition between offices, departments and ministries, between state, party and the military, seen elsewhere in the Nazi regime, officials fought over the moral high ground to prove that they cared more about the theatre than others. An incident from the small town of Landsberg (Wartheland) illustrates this rivalry. In October 1944, after the closure of the municipal thea-tre in Landsberg, two former members of the dance ensemble complained to the Reich Theatre Chamber about the way they were being treated both at the IG Farben factory they now had to work in and by the Landsberg’s municipal authorities. The dancers said that they had been driven to suicide attempts although the local Reich Theatre Chamber representative claimed these were probably bogus. In the end, however, one of the dancers did indeed commit suicide. What is interesting concerning the prolonged exchange of letters is that the actual suicide and the misreading of earlier signs were not commented upon any further and quickly turned into a secondary event. What the protagonists at the IG Farben factory, the city administration and the Reich Theatre Chamber really cared about was that their individual commitment to the theatre in general was being put into question. Nobody wanted to be “accused” of being unsupportive towards the theatre. The plea of the dancers, however, was not really taken that seriously, and, reading between the lines, one can even detect a mutual understanding between all parties that the dancers probably overreacted and could have pulled themselves together.18
Correct procedures were being upheld even if the theatres in question had already been closed and their respective cities were lost to the Reich. In February 1945 the German actor Günter Stroeks, who had been employed at Litzmannstadt’s theatre, complained to the civic authorities that he had not received his salary for that month. By that time the city was no longer officially German and had been liberated by the Soviet Red Army, the theatre had been closed, the company had disbanded, thousands of people had fled the advancing Soviet army, and even Stroeks had long left the city. Large parts of Germany were already occupied by Allied troops, most German cities lay in ruins, the military situation was utterly hopeless, and unconditional surrender was only a few months away. Yet Stroeks received a detailed reply to his complaint from the city’s former mayor (now in exile in Cottbus), who informed him that his salaries for December 1944 and January 1945 had been paid “in an orderly fashion”, and that he could draw upon his upcoming salary from 15 February 1945 at “any Sparkasse bank in the Reich”. This was not an isolated case.19 Protocol was still keenly followed. In November 1944 the artistic director of the small Upper Silesian touring theatre in a letter to the Reich Theatre Chamber suggested that the circulars sent to artistic directors should henceforth go only to him and not to all the venues belonging to his circuit (in Brieg, Bunzlau and Glogau). He argued that he was the artistic director after all, and also that “there was no one present in the towns of Brieg, Bunzlau and Glogau anymore”. Twelve days later the Chamber agreed but added that as soon as these venues were operating again they would receive the circulars once more “as they were entitled to receive them”.20 After the Reich Theatre Chamber lost all its files in an air raid in late 1943 it was at pains to update its records subsequently. “Personnel questionnaires” were sent out even if the theatre company in question had already left. Krakau’s theatre, for example, was asked to return the questionnaires in late August 1944 at a time when the whole ensemble had already fled the city and taken refuge in Breslau.21 As late as February 1945 the Deutsches Theater in Lille (though no longer at Lille but rather at Weimar and not performing anymore) still received subsidies. The Propaganda Ministry noted that RM 100,000 had been transferred into the theatre’s bank account.22 In March 1945 the Reich Theatre Chamber confirmed that all contracts issued from the Deutsches Theater in den besetzten Niederlanden, although this had now transferred to Gera, were still legally valid for the remaining financial year. The Chamber also gratefully acknowledged that all moveable items relating to the Hague enterprise had been safely relocated to Gera, including a whole train wagon with “over 5,000 costumes and costume parts”, including expensive fabrics, and the “entire stage lighting machinery […], woodworking and sewing machines”.23
Efforts to uphold “normality” – with regard to administrative procedures as well as a basic understanding that the 1944 closure of theatres was just temporary – extended well beyond September 1944, and for some protagonists even beyond 1945. In a mix of a stubborn refusal to accept new political realities and a fundamental belief that many of these theatres had simply been reflections of a superior German culture, a powerful discourse of remembering these German theatres extended well into the 1960s and 1970s. To argue, therefore, that these theatres left without a trace in 1945 is hardly possible.
Notes
1 See Die Blätter der Reichsgautheater Posen 1941/2, review of 1941/2 season, pp. 205–206 (Herder Institut Marburg, 34 VIII P120 Z23).
2 See letter by Rainer to the Reich Theatre Chamber dated 15 December 1943. It is not clear what happened to him after the arrest (see BArch, R56 III/617, no pagination in file).
3 See letter by Fritz Kaiser at the Deutsche Theater Prag to the Prague Job Office (Arbeitsamt) dated 16 March 1944. On the letter there is a handwritten note (presumably by someone at the Job Office) saying “gut” (also underlined) (see Národní archiv, Office for Cultural Affairs at the Reich Protectorate in Bohemia and Moravia, IV-1 T 5030-5470, p. 14).
4 See ibid., pp. 89–96, with several short notes concerning Prinz/Smejkal dated between July 1944 and February 1945.
5 Letter by Krüger to Reich Theatre Chamber dated 11 March 1944, reply from Bergen on 15 March 1944 (BArch, R56 III/643. File with no pagination; this correspondence is the only content).
6 BArch, R56 III/217, no pagination in file. Letters dated 3 and 13 March 1944.
7 See BArch, R56 III/154.
8 See BArch, R56 III/219, no pagination in file.
9 See Podlasiak, Deutsches Theater in Thorn, pp. 168–169.
10 See the theatre’s press release dated 6 June 1944 (BArch, R56 III/187, no pagination in file).
11 See letter to Berlin dated 11 September 1944 (BArch, R56 III/552, no pagination in file).
12 See Abbey/Havekamp, German Theatre in Lille, p. 282.
13 See a long letter written by general artistic manager (Generalintendant) Friedrichfranz Stampe to the head of the Reich Theatre Chamber Rolf Roenneke dated 19 September 1944, in which he discussed the situation at the Krakau theatre in detail – not without making sure that he appeared in the best possible light. In September Stampe was still in Krakau (see BArch, R56 III/285).
14 See various bits of correspondence concerning various matters, including contractual issues, as the Propaganda Ministry’s Rudolf Schultz von Dratzig in December 1944 asked Fritz Oehmke at the Office for Cultural Affairs to reduce the salary of the head of administration (Verwaltungsdirektor) from RM 13,200 to RM 12,000, which Oehmke duly carried out (see Národní archiv, Office for Cultural Affairs at the Reich Protectorate in Bohemia and Moravia, IV-1 T 5030–5470, pp. 221–222, 243–245).
15 See BArch, R56 III/2a.
16 This decision was taken by Goebbels and lasted throughout the 1944/5 season (see, for example, BArch, R56 III/ 285, no pagination in file).
17 Letter by Maurach to Roenneke dated 23 December 1944 with addendum two days later, reply by Roenneke dated 3 January 1945. In the original German both Maurach and Roenneke agreed that the “Intendant für Ordnung sorgen […] muss” so that he can “das berüchtigte Tingeln und die damit Hand in Hand-gehende drohende Verschmierung verhindern” (BArch, R56/III 154).
18 See various letters from the different protagonists dated 18 October 1944, 30 October 1944 and 6 November 1944. When the Reich Theatre Chamber sent their last letter on 29 December 1944, Landsberg’s city administration had probably already been evacuated (see BArch, R56 III/591). In terms of employment after the closure of theatres most male actors – if they were deemed fit to fight – were sent to the army. Otherwise, they worked for the Organisation Todt in the woods and fields (e.g. to erect tank barriers). The female employees either had to work in factories or were sent home. In one interesting case at the Graudenz theatre a Norwegian tenor refused to carry out the assigned tasks; a letter by a German official suggests that he did so on political grounds because he did not want to contribute to Germany’s war effort. The only repercussion he faced was that his contract was not renewed, and he returned to Oslo (letter dated 11 September 1944, BArch, R56 III/552, no pagination in file).
19 BArch, R56 III/284. The former artistic director of the theatre in Graudenz, Herr Kliewer, received a reply from the Reich Theatre Chamber as late as March 1945 with information concerning his salary and who to turn to if this failed to materialise (see BArch, R56 III/286). The exchange of letters in this file also illustrates the human aspect and the precarious life of the people forced to leave their homeland and almost everything they owned.
20 Letter by artistic director Herr Wagner to the Reich Theatre Chamber dated 17 November 1944. Reply by Rolf Roenneke in the Reich Theatre Chamber dated 29 November 1944 (BArch, R56/III 146 – no pagination, this file only contains this particular exchange of letters).
21 See BArch, R56 III/587 (file with no pagination).
22 See BArch, R55/20513, p. 455.
23 Letter dated 24 March 1945 (BArch, R56 III/187, file without pagination).