Munich: cabaret artist HG. Butzko takes stock in the Lustspielhaus – Munich
If someone grew up next to the Glückauf-Kampfbahn in Gelsenkirchen and later chooses Berlin-Kreuzberg as their adopted home, then it’s more likely not to be flowery and artificial. That’s HG. Butzko is also known for his clear speech, for greetings like “This is not the land of smiles” and as a buddy-like “brain pacemaker” of German cabaret. At the premiere in the Lustspielhaus, Butzko didn’t tie any ribbons to his anniversary program “Oh yes” for 25 years on stage, but got straight to the point.
This is then first a detailed review of the governments and rulers of these past 25 years. They are always connected with “Just a moment before I start”. Butzko loves such running gags, so this time he adds after each political sentence played that he recently won the – optional – Scharping/Schröder/Merkel Parodist Prize. The first is a kind of memory refresher for people of the same age, with only a few references to the present (at most a “We had mummy for 16 years, now we are ruled by grandfather”), based on the selected quotes with the quintessence that the former EU – Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker delivers: “When things get serious, you have to lie.”
In the second half of the program, this will then be transferred to the current crisis, to Corona and the Ukraine war. As devil’s advocate and not afraid of making mistakes – which he quickly puts aside – he allows the dominant view of things to contrast with that of the other side. Because that’s what Butzko is all about: differentiation and respect for minority opinions. An elementary motif of the Enlightenment that quickly fell out of fashion, for which he also made a name for himself in the Lustspielhaus because hardly anyone can do it as wittily as he does (again on Friday, October 19, in the laughing and shooting society).