Wolfgang Böck premieres police stories at Reichenau cultural festival

Actor Wolfgang Böck presented the Austrian premiere of his new programme Trautmann lacht! at the Reichenau Cultural Summer on Sunday, bringing real and fictional stories about police, the justice system and public authorities to the stage, ORF reported.

The setting in the ballroom of Reichenau Castle in the Neunkirchen district was deliberately simple, with a black curtain, a table and a glass of water. Böck’s performance provided the focus as he shifted between voices, tones and characters, turning seemingly ordinary texts and official documents into short scenes.

The stories include unusual encounters with police, rules in government buildings, missing dentures, court proceedings and a visit to a passport office. Böck told noe.ORF.at that the programme combines anecdotes from everyday police work with numerous literary stories, some of which are “truly bizarre”.

For Böck, the humour comes less from the police or public authorities than from the people who meet there. “We all make mistakes,” he said. Viewed from a certain distance, and when one is not personally affected, people can allow themselves “a little schadenfreude”, he said. Humour was something “typically human”.

Trautmann as the starting point

The evening would not have been created without Trautmann. Böck said the idea came from his agent, Herbert Strobl. The character had been “a decisive part of my life”, prompting the idea of bringing the role back in a sense.

Böck first played the Viennese police officer in Kaisermühlen Blues and later in the ORF series Trautmann, a role he held for more than 10 years in total. Audiences sometimes blurred the actor and the character, he said, and the role therefore also contained something of himself. He added that he would not read texts in the new programme that he did not personally like.

Lower Austria state police director Franz Popp, who attended the premiere, also said police work provided material for comedy. There were many interesting encounters and incidents that could prompt a smile, he told noe.ORF.at, despite the generally serious nature of the job.

Audience filled the hall

Before the premiere, Böck said he could not predict how audiences would respond. A premiere remained exciting even after many years on stage, and with a completely new programme there was “no idea at all” how it would be received, particularly because humour was highly individual.

Those concerns were not borne out at the Austrian premiere. Böck’s shifts between dry delivery, different characters and almost casually delivered punchlines repeatedly drew laughter from the approximately 250 guests in the sold-out hall. Böck had said he wanted visitors above all to leave “in a good mood”.

Trautmann lacht! is part of the Reichenau Cultural Summer organised by the Lower Austria Chamber of Labour. The event series is being held for the seventh time this year.

Because the Parkhotel Hirschwang is undergoing extensive renovation, the festival has moved to the ballroom of Reichenau Castle for this season. Tickets cost 25 euros, and the programme continues until September 6, featuring artists including Ursula Strauss, Max Müller and Die Kernölamazonen.

Cabaret performer and author Joesi Prokopetz, who attended Böck’s reading, said such events also had regional significance. They were not only about supporting artists, he told noe.ORF.at, but also about “bringing culture to the regions”.