MOSCOW, December 16 Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov said that German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visited his BAROCCO performance in Hamburg, “drank wine in the smoking room,” and after the performance he talked with artists.
«Olaf Scholz unexpectedly visited our BAROCCO performance at the Thalia Theater (Hamburg). First, he drank wine in the smoking room, and after the performance he went backstage and expressed his delight to the artists. At the same time, Thilo Werner (actor — ed.) in an improvisation on the song Besogna morire , one verse of which was sung in Hungarian, joked about the “relationship” between Scholz and Orban (Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban — ed.). Everyone laughed, and the chancellor didn’t seem offended,” the director wrote in his Telegram channel.
Serebrennikov, speaking about the details of the chancellor’s visit, added that on Friday evening there was a call from the federal criminal police department, which notified Scholz’s desire to attend the performance with his wife Britta Ernst upon his arrival from Brussels.
«And so it happened. At ten minutes to eight, two limousines arrived quietly, at the gate there was a short reception with champagne with director Joachim Lux, and then Scholz and Ernst sat in the middle of the stalls, row seven, between the astonished guests («Hello, Olaf»). Security guards around him. «According to him, his biggest worry in Brussels was that Viktor Orban's speech would be so long that he would have to miss the performance at Thalia,» Serebrennikov noted.
The EU summit on December 14 decided to launch negotiations on the future membership in the European Union with Ukraine and Moldova. According to several media reports, Scholz invited Hungarian Prime Minister Orban to leave the room where EU leaders were holding a vote on Ukraine and drink coffee. This allowed the leaders of the remaining 26 European countries to decide in favor of starting negotiations with Kiev Later, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and External Economic Relations of Hungary, Péter Szijjártó, called such messages “tabloid.”