Currently no performances
Being against the war – and yet making a living from it. Fearing losses – and planning for them. Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage acts sensibly. And nonetheless ends up in trouble, for war does not recognise neutrality. She's just trying to survive – and helps to keep the war going in the process. Ulrich Rasche directs Brecht for the first time.
The world is in flames – and you hope you won't be affected. That you can stay out of it. That business will continue despite everything. Brecht wrote "Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder" ("Mother Courage and Her Children") in exile in 1939 as a warning against being "neutral" in the face of the coming Second World War. And so he wrote a play about war – and about those who try to survive it without being destroyed by it: the travelling saleswoman Mother Courage travels through the Thirty Years' War in her covered wagon. She sells what people need, haggles over prices and calculates risks. War is her business. And her risk. She doesn't want it, yet she needs it, makes money from it and contributes to its continuation. She wants to protect her children – and loses them precisely because of that. She acts sensibly – and yet exactly that is her undoing. She just wants to survive – and gets involved in the end anyway. Everything has its price. And perhaps that is what makes this play so unsettling: you can't avoid war by simply adapting to it. Some people profit from it – but others are paying the price elsewhere.
Ulrich Rasche is one of the most unconventional directors in contemporary German-language theatre. His choral works, characterised by meticulous rhythm and physical rigour, have been invited to the Berliner Theatertreffen on multiple occasions. He is now directing Brecht for the first time at the Berliner Ensemble.
- Ulrich Rasche Regie
- Steffen Heinke Licht
- Johannes Nölting Dramaturgie
