Club Gewalt about its radical feminist Christmas musical: ‘We are never afraid to make it uncomfortable’

‘Do you know someone who… that Übergang ist gone?” “Yes.” „Und Have you talked to that person? über that Übergang?” Oh dear. With the microphone still pointed at me, I dig through my memory, looking for any conversations I’ve had about menopause – I find none. The frontwoman of punk rock band Herr Hamsterfleisch knows how to deal with such a “no”. In her imaginative mix of Dutch and German, she suggests practicing that conversation immediately. Just talk to the person sitting next to you about “that Übergang,” she says.

There is no one sitting next to me yet when I go to rehearsals for the Christmas musical on December 3 Herr Hamsterfleisch und de Angry Antz of music and performance collective Club Gewalt. The premiere will take place in a few days, on Saturday, December 7. Further down the hall at the Rotterdam Theater Walhalla is Romana Vrede, who is the final director of the play. She turns to me. We talk about the empty chairs on this drizzly Tuesday evening über that Übergang.

“We are never afraid to make it uncomfortable,” says Suzanne Kipping of Club Gewalt, who wrote the music for the performance together with Robbert Klein. We moved to the office above the room. The costumes of the band members hang on the clothing rack that is set up there: leather and latex, large collars, a skirt with three rubber dildos on the back. But the colors are festive. Bright red, shiny gold. A bit of Wonderwoman, a bit of Christmas and a bit… “BDSM,” adds Anne van de Wetering, responsible for the text of the performance together with Elly Scheele. “The style of Herr Hamsterfleisch is very BDSM.”

We wanted to question that white feminist material and put it in a new light. And that’s what we used this musical for

Craziness

Herr Hamsterfleisch is one of the alter egos of Club Gewalt, Kipping and Van de Wetering explain. This “radical feminist sister” of the theater company is the brainchild of Gewalt member Loulou Hameleers, who was inspired eight years ago by the German performer Nina Hagen – also known as the godmother of German punk. “Loulou was a big fan of her way of performing,” says Kipping. “That craziness. She went hard on that. So we wrote some of those weird prog rock songs for her.” Since then, Herr Hamsterfleisch has grown into a band in its own right, which has performed at the popular music festival Down the Rabbit Hole, among others.

But in those eight years, the members of Club Gewalt have also changed. “Herr Hamsterfleisch has many songs about taking up space and celebrating womanhood. There are songs about vulvas, about witches. Some things from the repertoire feel a bit outdated to us now,” says Kipping. “We wanted to question that white feminist material and put it in a new light. And that’s what we used this musical for.”

In the Christmas musical, that starting point led to short punk songs with titles such as ‘Feminism without intersectionality is just white superiority’ and ‘More is needed to protect the rule of law than voting every now and then’. The performance also includes a ten-minute musical number in which Herr Hamsterfleisch wonders whether, in her desire to take up space, she is crossing other people’s boundaries. The musical also shows the coming of age of Club Gewalt’s radical sister: the frontwoman of Herr Hamsterfleisch shifts her attention from the individual to the collective interest.

Punk rock and Dickens

In addition to Nina Hagen, Hang Youth (a punk rock band that became known with songs under a minute) and Hedwig and the Angry Inch (a musical about a fictional rock and roll band) further served Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol as a source of inspiration. Only Herr Hamsterfleisch is not visited by three ghosts, but by life-size ants. “They can of course work together very well,” explains Kipping. “They need each other to survive. And we just had fucking sick ant costumes.” And then Herr Hamsterfleisch is also assisted on stage by the Rotterdam punk band Venus Tropicaux.

This creative convergence of styles and influences fits with Club Gewalt’s ambition to expand the boundaries of the musical genre. A significant number of the musicals that are now being made are also about the past, says Kipping: “There is a lot of looking back. We make an attempt to look ahead, and use a story that takes place in the ‘now’.” Although Van de Wetering sometimes wonders “how on earth you make a musical these days. Human rights are being violated on such a gross scale, while nothing is happening politically. Sometimes it feels so hard to do anything. But it also feels necessary to do something.”

Herr Hamsterfleisch also struggles with that dilemma. To keep such heavy and uncomfortable themes manageable for both the audience and itself, Club Gewalt puts a lot of humor into its work. “We always have quotes that stand above the rehearsal process,” Kipping laughs. “One of them is: ‘Humor is welcome’.” Some other mottos: “Don’t fill in for someone else.” “Voicing fears.” “Conflict is not bad.” “Don’t talk over the other person.” Each and every one of them is a motto that resonates Herr Hamsterfleisch und de Angry Antz.

“This performance is also about basic human skills,” says Van de Wetering. “It’s so easy to ask: ‘Hey, how are you?’. Or to say sorry.” So try that for Christmas dinner, Club Gewalt suggests. You may have little influence on world politics, but on a small scale you can certainly make a difference. So ask a tough question. Say sorry when you cross a line. “We can continue to have conversations at home on a micro level that are getting so out of hand at a macro level,” says Van de Wetering. “That gives me hope.”

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