As indicated by its title this play, written on the occasion of Michael’s 60th birthday, describes Michael’s life story in 10 scenes, with segueing intermediate texts of a narrator.

Written in 2013 Première in Theater die Neue Tribüne, Wien, on 31.10.2013

Beatrice and René, two singers, bearing costumes and props, enter the wardrobe of a theatre in order to prepare for the approaching concert after Beatrice’s 20-year absence from the theatre. Beatrice’s initial nerves turn into emotional discussions about their mutual past, and slowly wane with each musical number performed on stage. Soon enough, the private discussions they had in the wardrobe begin to mix with the musical texts performed on stage. The finale is their reconciliation and the confirmation that, as in the olden days, their professional lives are reunited, even though their private lives have taken different directions.

Première in October 2012 in Neue Tribüne Wien

René and Beatrice, two singers, meet up with their pianist in a theatre to rehearse for an up-coming Fritz Löhner Beda evening. As if travelling through time, Beatrice and René repeatedly turn into Helene and Fritz Löhner Beda, and tell the story of their lives from 1928, the year in which Fritz Löhner Beda celebrated his 45th birthday. This was just before his career really kicked off. The scene keeps on changing to the present, in which the two singers rehearse the musical numbers that Löhner has just written. That which starts out as cheerful, peppy and carefree is gradually overshadowed by the political situation of the approaching Second World War. After Fritz is picked up by the Gestapo Helene, who has stayed in Vienna, desperately tries to have her husband released from “protective custody”. However, she too falls victim to National Socialism in the end.