Modeled on Western European examples, there is a growing market for musicals in the countries of the Centrope region, and the genre is booming. However, unlike Vienna, for example, which has two theaters for musical productions using a stagione system in which each production is cast separately and has an uninterrupted run of performances, most theaters in the Centrope region use a repertory system with a permanent company and rotating productions. Among the most active theaters for musical productions in the CEE countries are the Nemzeti Theater in Győr, the Nová Scéna Theater or the Heineken Tower Theater and the Wüstenrot Theater Gedur in Bratislava, or the Mĕstské divadlo (Municipal Theater) Brno.
In program, some musical theaters in the Centrope region tend to rely on the classics of the genre. The Municipal Theater in Brno, for example, shows a number of Broadway hits from “Hello Dolly” and “Les Misérables” to “Evita” and “Jesus Christ Superstar”, but also more recent successes such as “Spring Awakening”, the adaptation of Frank Wedekind’s scandalous drama by Duncan Sheik and Steven Slater. Others seek to attract audiences with original productions that have more of a local appeal, such as the Nemzeti Theater in Győr with the patriotic “Egri csillagok” (“Stars of Eger”), the musical adaptation of Géza Gárdonyi’s historical novel of 1899, or the Nová Scéna in Bratislava with “Šialené nožničky” (“Crazy Scissors”), a crime comedy about a murder in a barber shop.
Theresa Steininger
