This is a perfect extraction;  after outsourcing a part of my mind into my book, I have now outsourced my body, too, and can let it do tours and all the unpleasant stuff.

Tonight writer Thomas Melle is holding a lecture on instability. However, the speaker is not Thomas Melle himself but a copy in the shape of a humanoid robot. Stefan Kaegi of Rimini Protokoll, an award-winning  company focusing on documentary theatre, explores the consequences of putting a humanoid robot on stage. What are the reactions of Thomas Melle himself and of the audience? Can this kind of performance still be described as “theatre”?

Courtesy of Gabriela Neeb.

Director Christopher Rüping had always felt detached from ancient Greek drama. The chorus, the language, and the role of fate created an artificial world that had nothing to do with our reality. When watching Greek drama, he found that he began to be engaged by the play only when it was almost over. When those dramas were written, they were presented at the Dionysia, a drama competition (Agon) that went on for five days. Dionysia were ecstatic festivals with free wine and free food, starting early in the morning and going on until late at night. Christopher Rüping knew he could not recreate the Dionysia but he decided to be bold and to present a tetralogy, composed of three dramas and one satyr play. Ten hours of theatre would allow his antique drama to unfold.

Courtesy of Julian Baumann.

Morning in Byzantium is the second Kammerspiele Production by New York director and choreographer Trajal Harrell. Whereas Juliet & Romeo focused on youthful death, Morning in Byzantium sees the end of life as only one of various possibilities, and the director chooses life.

Courtesy of Orpheas Emirzas.

Munich Kammerspiele – Season 2018/19

Justice is “out” and immortality is “in”.

Artistic Director Matthias Lilienthal presented the new season together with directors Christopher Rüping, Susanne Kennedy, and Trajal Harrell in June. Whilst the press were enjoying Lebanese pizza and wine, Lilienthal announced  thirteen new productions for 2018/19 of which seven would be world premieres.

Argentinean documentary director Lola Arias, who is best known for her theatre work, recently presented her debut film Teatro de guerra at the Berlin Film Festival. Related to her play Minefield  that opened at the Royal Court Theatre in 2016, followed by a world tour, the film features six war veterans from the UK and Argentina who re-enact their experiences and relive their trauma of war together. A master of documentary fiction, Arias is interested in personal stories in a larger historical context, and for her new production she has chosen a highly relevant subject indeed.

Courtesy of Thomas Aurin.

Damian Rebgetz, born in Darwin, Australia, has been a member of the Kammerspiele ensemble since 2015, playing such diverse roles as Yasha in The Cherry Orchard and das Fräulein in Mittelreich. With his background in classical music and music theatre, Rebgetz’s desire to present a lieder recital did not come as a surprise. Yet the material he had chosen was rather unusual.

Courtesy of Tien Nguyen The.

Polish singer, actor and director Marta Górnicka began developing her concept of a new modern and tragic choir theatre at the Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute in Warsaw. In 2010, Górnicka  founded her “Choir of Women”and her first production This is the Chorus Speaking, which added a political dimension to her work, premiered in Warsaw the same year, followed by the award winning production Magnificat, which toured internationally.

Courtesy of David Baltzer.

With the rise of the #MeToo movement and angry white men who want to turn back the clock to the good old days of gender inequality, plays discussing the war of the sexes have been produced in theatres all over Germany. Nicolas Stemann, resident director at the Kammerspiele chose August Strindberg‘s first naturalistic play The Father to contribute to this discussion.

Courtesy of Thomas Aurin.

Christopher Rüping‘s distillation of Shakespeare’s most famous play places Hamlet in the here and now. His story is told by three Horatios, who take over all the parts in this heavily cut production.

Courtesy of Thomas Aurin.

Toshiki Okada is one of the most important Asian directors. No Sex is his third work for the Kammerspiele, it premiered on 14th April 2018. A stage director and author, Okada founded the theatre group chelfitsch in 1997, which had their first international success with 5 Days in March, a play about two young people fleeing to a love hotel to have sex for five days. His latest play deals with a group of young men who think that sex no longer matters.

Courtesy of Julian Baumann.