Review: Morfars mauser
Lilla Teatern’s performance about how grandpa’s Mauser was almost used depicts how difficult it can be to reconcile
No one becomes a better person by having been a victim of bullying. On the contrary, it creates self-absorbed and self-pitying adults. Lilla Teatern’s Grandfather’s Mauser is a well-acted, gripping and honest performance about the consequences of school bullying that depicts the adult victim’s rage at not being able to let go of the past.
Rolle (Tobias Zilliacus) is just about to present the weather report on the TV news when he receives a phone call that completely twists him out of his mind.
It’s his mother who calls. A classmate from primary school is dying and wants to see him.
The conversation makes him so confused that he starts rambling and dizzy – the broadcast has to be interrupted.
Marcus Rosenlund’s play Grandpa’s Mauser , which is based on his own experiences, depicts 12-year-old Rolle’s upbringing in Kauniainen in the early eighties.
Bullies and a fake
The affluent suburb is not a good place for the working-class boy Rolle to grow up. The town’s troublemakers bully him mercilessly and incessantly.
He has a great head for reading and a passion for science, astronomy and weather, which only makes him more laughable in his social environment.
Rolle’s best friend Henrik (Markus Riuttu) is almost as outcast as he is. His family is rich, but the wrong kind of rich for the suburbs where only old money counts.
His father is a successful pop star who travels around the country, his bitter mother travels away when it occurs to her. Henrik has to stay at home with only a fat weekly allowance, which is uncomforting in the loneliness.
One moment, Rolle and Henrik go to the sledding slope and have fun, but as soon as the bullies show up, Henrik takes their side and participates in the bullying.
In the long run, it is not the bullies but Henrik’s duplicity that arouses the deepest anger in Rolle.
Only at his grandparents’ home is it quiet. There, his grandfather (Joachim Wigelius), a veteran of the Winter War, sits in his usual armchair while his grandmother (Pia Runnakko) tinkers in the kitchen.
The whole house is surrounded by a force field of security that flows out of Grandpa and his amulet from the war, a light blue butterfly made of tin. And in a cupboard at his grandparents’ house, Rolle finds his grandfather’s Mauser, a semi-automatic pistol from the war.
The weapon fascinates him to the point that he takes it to his own room and practices with it in front of the mirror. At the library, he reads up on the caliber, how the fuse works. He wonders where he could find ammunition.
Unhappy children become unhappy adults
Mainly, however, Grandpa’s Mauser is a story told from the adult Rolle’s perspective. He starts a family and has a successful career as a meteorologist on the TV news.
But despite this, he is unable to leave the past behind and notices that he has grown up to be a self-absorbed and self-pitying person.
Even when Henrik is on his deathbed, after he has squandered all his money and lived like a human wreck on the streets of Phuket, he cannot bring himself to meet him and reconcile with his past.
Strong role interpretations
Grandpa’s Mauser is a demanding but profound portrayal of how bullying as a phenomenon leaves traces in those affected who live on throughout their lives. Rolle comes stumbling close to resorting to lethal violence against his classmates.
Tobias Zilliacus in the lead role does an impressive job of keeping the performance together and devotedly and convincingly delivers the demanding monologues that form central parts of the play.
Markus Riuttu shines in his interpretation of Henrik. The poor boy has no chance, cowardly and lonely he grows up to be a deeply unhappy and broken person.
The false friend develops into the key role of the story, embodying weakness and betrayal, but also the hope of reconciliation.
Joachim Wigelius and Pia Runnakko portray all the others, from parents and grandparents to bullies, and add a grateful versatility to the different roles.
Joachim Wigelius’ interpretation of the low-key and unyielding grandfather in particular takes on a rather Clint Eastwood-like emphasis.
The performance, directed by Michaela Granit, makes quite a lot of use of video projections, pieces of music and an expressive symbolism that at times feels somewhat over-explicit.
In the long run, the performance builds up a powerful emotional state that describes the frustration and rage of being stuck, and far into life is still defined by the meaningless meanness of childhood.