Harald ante portas. May Franz Lehar forgive the headline, but TV host and actor Harald Schmidt and Christian Brey will be directing the operetta “The Merry Widow” at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein. The fact that a popular entertainer like Schmidt is involved in Düsseldorf with an operetta production may be cause for surprise and even bewilderment.

However, the media-happy moderator, author, columnist, entertainer, satirist and actor has a great deal of stage experience. His first gig as an actor was in Augsburg from 1981-84. After this, he quickly changed his discipline to cabaret and came to Düsseldorf to the Kom(m)ödchen theater where he took lessons from and worked together with Kay and Lore Lorentz. Now he has, in a sense, come home with Christian Brey, Franz Lehar and the merry widow. The humorous cynic Schmidt has promised for December “thrilling music, strong emotions and a bankrupt state - no better way to pass the time between the parliamentary elections and the New Year!”

Lehar’s “Merry Widow” marked the birth of modern operetta in 1905. The story, in brief: The Grand Duchy Pontevedro is almost bankrupt. Its ambassador to France, Zeta, holds a ball during which an attractive millionaire’s widow is to be paired with the Pontevedro Count Danilo in an attempt to save his beloved country from financial ruin. In a party that is full of high society passion and lust and the kindling of almost-forgotten amours, Danilo’s love is victorious in the end - even without the millions. The loser might be Pontevedro, but the winner is “The Merry Widow” and the audience.