I've never been that much a fan of the theater, but Schnitzler's "Das weite Land" struck me immensely. So I've had my trouble with this adaptation, which, without any doubt is very well done and probably would have been appreciated by Schnitzler himself, but I've had big troubles taking it serious, because the dialogue always sounds a bit funny to me in this dialect. Actually, it's a comedy - in the Schnitzler sort of way, which means all the acting persons are playing roles in their real life - but for me the overall impact of the play is displayed better in a down-to-earth language than in a quaint dialect.
2 Reviews
True Austrian culture, watch it, rather than read the play
fharland22 April 2007
Having read a previous comment by a German from Gelsenkirchen, I feel obligated to respond. I am a former assistant of Otto Preminger and started working at Max Reinhart's Joseftstadttheater. The language which has been restored in this production is true Austrian, (not a quaint slang or dialect), more so it is the language in which Schnitzler's play was originally written. If you would like to see the play in an interpretation, as it was originally intended by the author, consider this the most appropriate version I can think of. World class performances by a cast of true Viennese actors, whose tradition and culture has been lost meanwhile in the process of cultural globalization.
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