Review: Spring Awakening
SPRING IS WAKING UP
Helsinki City Theatre’s new musical Spring Awakening tells the story of adolescents struggling under the pressure of mental and physical growing pains and the collision of their worlds with adults and social authorities. The meeting of generations creates a dark drama, which is underlined by the music and set design. The talented cast and themes touching on universal problems ensure that strong emotions are experienced in the audience.
Spring Awakening is based on the play Spring Awakening (Frühlings Erwachen), written by the German writer Frank Wedekind in 1891, with the subtitle “Child Tragedy”. The play was first performed in Germany fifteen years later, but was banned by the authorities. The play suffered the same fate many times, and it was not performed uncensored until the 1970s in America and England.
The musical to be seen at the Helsinki City Theatre is a creation by Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik, which premiered on Broadway in 2006 and has won several Tony Awards, and is based on a play text by author Wedekind. The musical depicts the life challenges of adolescents in the face of life’s big questions in a harrowingly touching way. The least questions are raised by one’s own changing body, whose messages are difficult to interpret.
Young people look for answers in literature and from each other, the bravest ask their parents. A helpless mother tries to explain to her daughter the basics of reproduction, but ends up getting closer to a stork than even to flowers and bees. The daughter becomes pregnant and still does not understand what and how everything has happened. “Mom, I asked why you didn’t tell me,” the daughter shouts desperately to her mother.
A mother takes her daughter to a doctor who performs illegal abortions, even though she knows that she will cause her to die by doing so. So even a dead daughter is better than a shameful teenage mother. Maintaining the façade by any means has strong connections to the world of the 21st century.
The joy of performing
There is no weak link in the musical Spring Awakening. Every professional behind the production has given their best. The whole is sensitive and bold at the same time, as well as tearful and laughable. The performance is not recommended for children under the age of 15 or sensitive adults. There is lovemaking and masturbation on stage, homosexuality and incest are present in the story.
The scenes are elegantly and delicately executed, but the viewer is still not let off the hook. The musical evokes emotions and thoughts – also in adult viewers. It takes quite a bit of sternness and small-mindedness from the viewer to disapprove of the musical’s “powerful” scenes – yet the musical will certainly find its most suitable audience in the younger generation.
Young audiences are also attracted to the musical in Finland with a new way of selling seats on stage. “How would it feel to sit on stage in the middle of a rock concert, to be part of a performance?”, Helsinki City Theatre advertises its unique “stage seats”. Each performance sells 22 student-priced tickets to the stage.
Spring Awakening proves that the Finnish theatre and musical world has a bright future. Like the City Theatre’s youth musical High School Musical last autumn, Spring Awakening is a celebration of young professionals that communicates the joy of making and interpreting art.
The musical roles are partly double-cast. At the premiere, the main roles in the musical Spring Awakening were played by Sara Melleri as the touching self-searching Wendla who believes in great love, and Jaakko Tamminen as the boldly critical and idealistic Melchior. Petrus Kähkönen’s Moritz, who saves his family’s honour by suicide, also leaves many questions in the viewer’s mind.
What is wrong with our world when a young seeker with a thirst for life feels that suicide is his only option?