Felicia Chin-Malenski

Robert Icke has congenially translated Arthur Schnitzler's play «Professor Bernhardi» into the present day. The doctor Ruth Wolff not only comes into conflict with her colleagues and the maxims of the Catholic Church, but also into a media shitstorm. The «Times» of London celebrated «The Doctor» as an «open-heart operation on our present day, which gets more complicated the deeper you cut».

Hollywood, glamour, seduction: Mara becomes a star in the game «Daddy». But the deeper she immerses herself in the dazzling dream world, the more the boundaries between reality and fiction become blurred. Marion Siéfert and Matthieu Bareyre transform the stage into a virtual playing field and expose the promises and abysses of the digital world.

Ishmael signs on to the «Pequod», an old whaler. However, it soon becomes clear that the aim of the voyage is not just to exploit the world's oceans and their giant marine mammals, but Captain Ahab's personal vendetta. Melville's «Moby Dick» - brought to the stage by Stefan Pucher - is both an adventurous sailor's yarn and a reflection on the fatal art of seduction of a demagogue.

At Whitsun the lion king Nobel invites his subjects to his court for an early summer celebration. The entire animal kingdom gathers – ranging from the crane to the wolf and the bear. Only one animal is missing: the fox called Reineke. As soon as his name his mentioned, the mood of harmony vanishes. One angry accusation follows another and Reinike the fox is charged in his absence with a series of incredible crimes. The cockerel, for example, complains of losing his wife and children – Reineke ate them for supper. When he is eventually put on trial, the accomplished liar – an animal equivalent of Ibsen’s Peer Gynt – manages to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes – man, woman or creature – and slip his neck out of the noose. Eventually he even acquires a whole crowd of followers and is elected Chancellor.

The moral of the story is that not everyone with foxy cunning and a talent for oratory puts those gifts to benevolent use – on the contrary! But how can we tell the difference between truth and lies? How can we avoid being taken in by the peddlers of fake news? How can we remain faithful to our own opinions and values?

In Stephan Kimmig's production, the boundaries between Shakespeare's fairy world and the harsh reality of the big city become blurred. Fuelled by Puck's magic, a summer night unfolds in which soon no one knows where love ends and obsession begins.

What do we need to make theatre? Does theatre have a tangible impact on our lives?

Based on a reading of Bertolt Brecht's 77-part «A Short Organum for the Theatre», the South Korean director Kyung-Sung Lee and the ensemble of the Residenztheater explore the current crises in Korea, Germany and the world, playfully testing whether Brecht could still help us to understand the world better today.