Schauspiel Köln is a theatre and company in
Cologne
Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...
,
North Rhine-Westphalia
North Rhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine/Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW, is a States of Germany, state () in Old states of Germany, Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabitants, it is the List of German states by population, most ...
, Germany. It forms together with the
Cologne Opera
The Cologne Opera (German language, German: Oper der Stadt Köln or Oper Köln) refers to both the main opera house in Cologne, Germany and its resident opera company.
History of the company
From the mid 18th century, opera was performed in the ...
and other houses the
Bühnen der Stadt Köln
Bühnen der Stadt Köln (engl.: Stages of the City of Cologne) is an umbrella term for different cultural institutions in Cologne. Schauspiel Köln and Cologne Opera
The Cologne Opera (German language, German: Oper der Stadt Köln or Oper K� ...
(Stages of the city of Cologne). The listed building has 830 seats in the Grand House, 120 in the locksmith and 60 in the refreshment room. In addition, the listed 'Halle Kalk' has 200 seats, it was used until closing in the summer of 2015 because of the danger of collapse. Since the 2013/14 season (September 2013) Depot 1 and Depot 2 have been used as interim venues during the extensive renovation of the Schauspielhaus on the site of the former Carlswerk in Schanzenstraße in Cologne-Mülheim.
Ernst Hardt was the
intendant
An intendant (; ; ) was, and sometimes still is, a public official, especially in France, Spain, Portugal, and Latin America. The intendancy system was a centralizing administrative system developed in France. In the War of the Spanish Success ...
before he moved on to the
Westdeutscher Rundfunk
(; "West German Broadcasting Cologne"), shortened to WDR (), is a German public broadcasting, public-broadcasting institution based in the States of Germany, Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia with its main office in Cologne. WDR is a const ...
in 1927.
History
The history of the Cologne theater begins in the
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...
. The first house was built in 1782, which was later called "Komödienstraße". A successor building from 1829 was destroyed in 1869 in a fire. In 1872, a new house was built in the Glockengasse (an historic street).
In May 1898, a new theatre building on
Habsburgerring was built. Based on a design by architect
Carl Moritz,
[Thorsten Leiendecker and Nadine Leiendecker ] a
neo-baroque Neo-Baroque may refer to:
* Neo-Baroque music
* Neo-Baroque painting, a painting style used by Christo Coetzee and others
*Baroque Revival architecture
* Neo-Baroque film
*the Organ reform movement
The Organ Reform Movement or ''Orgelbewegung'' ...
building with restaurant and garden terrace was built. The 1902 finished building had 1800 seats and eventually cost 3.9 million marks.
Cologne theater then had two large stages, which initially operated as "United City Theater", from the season 1906/07 as Opera House and Schauspielhaus, but were temporarily held together. In the new theater operas in particular, in the "old" house in the Glockengasse theater and operetta were performed. Both houses were run by Julius Hofmann, the then director of the Schauspielhaus.
1920 to 1945
Acting director Gustav Hartung engaged well-known Berlin actors such as
Heinrich George
Georg August Friedrich Hermann Schulz (9 October 1893 – 25 September 1946), better known as Heinrich George (), was a German stage and film actor.
Early life
George was born in Pomerania to August Friedrich Schulz, a former Deck Officer in t ...
to the theatre in the 1920s, which made the house known nationwide. In 1929,
Bertolt Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known as Bertolt Brecht and Bert Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a p ...
's
Threepenny Opera was scheduled to be performed in the Schauspielhaus. However, the conservative
Center Party tried to stop this.
Konrad Adenauer
Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer (5 January 1876 – 19 April 1967) was a German statesman and politician who served as the first Chancellor of Germany, chancellor of West Germany from 1949 to 1963. From 1946 to 1966, he was the first leader of th ...
, the mayor Cologne intervened and the play was performed.
At the time of the Nazi rule, the National Socialist opera director Alexander Spring was the general manager of the Kölner Bühnen and head of the Schauspielhaus. During the war, the two houses in the Glockengasse and the Habsburger Ring were destroyed or severely damaged. The theatre was heavily destroyed in a bombing raid in August 1943.
[Werner Jung: ''Das neuzeitliche Köln 1794–1914. Von der Franzosenzeit bis zum Ersten Weltkrieg.'' J.P. Bachem, Köln 2004, , Seite 215. (in German)] In August 1945, the theater was able to give performances in replacement venues such as the auditorium of the university as the first theater in the British occupation zone again. In addition, a hall in the
Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum in Ubierring was expanded to "Kammerspielen" and used until 1994 accordingly.
[
The 1902 theatre ruins were demolished in 1958.][
]
New building on the Offenbachplatz
The new building opened on 14 October 1956, it opened with a gala performance of Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith ( ; ; 16 November 189528 December 1963) was a German and American composer, music theorist, teacher, violist and conductor. He founded the Amar Quartet in 1921, touring extensively in Europe. As a composer, he became a major advo ...
's opera ''Mathis der Maler
''Mathis der Maler'' (''Matthias the Painter'' is an opera by Paul Hindemith. The work's protagonist, Matthias Grünewald, was a historical figure who flourished during the Reformation, and whose art, in particular the Isenheim Altarpiece, inspi ...
''.
In 1957, the stages moved from their makeshift venue in the auditorium to a newly built so-called multi-storey building on , where opera and operetta, ballet and drama were performed. In 1962, the new Schauspielhaus, designed by Wilhelm Riphahn
Wilhelm Riphahn (also Wilhelm Riphan; born 25 July 1889 in Cologne – 27 December 1963 in Cologne) was a German architect.
Riphahn studied at the technical universities in Berlin-Charlottenburg, Munich, and Karlsruhe. He worked for a Siem ...
, was completed and opened with Schiller
Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller (, short: ; 10 November 17599 May 1805) was a German playwright, poet, philosopher and historian. Schiller is considered by most Germans to be Germany's most important classical playwright.
He was born i ...
's ''Die Räuber
''The Robbers'' (', ) is the first dramatic play by German playwright Friedrich Schiller. The play was published in 1781 and premiered on 13 January 1782 in Mannheim and was inspired by Leisewitz's earlier play '' Julius of Taranto''. It was wr ...
'' in the staging of the later director Oscar Fritz Schuh
Oscar Fritz Schuh (15 January 1904 – 22 October 1984) was a German-Austrian opera director, theatre director and opera manager. He is known for directing Mozart operas at the Vienna State Opera and the Salzburg Festival in productions that tou ...
with actor Klausjürgen Wussow
Klausjürgen Wussow (30 April 1929 – 19 June 2007) was a German stage, film and television actor.
Early life
Wussow was born in Cammin, Province of Pomerania, Weimar Germany (modern Kamień Pomorski, Poland). His father was a teacher and ca ...
as Karl Moor. Federal President Heinrich Lübke
Karl Heinrich Lübke (; 14 October 1894 – 6 April 1972) was a German politician, who served as president of West Germany from 1959 to 1969.
He suffered from deteriorating health towards the end of his career and is known for a series of emba ...
also attended this performance.
In 1968, Hansgünther Heyme
Hansgünther Heyme (born 22 August 1935) is a German theatre director and prominent figure in the Regietheater movement of the 1960s and 70s. Born in Bad Mergentheim, he studied at Heidelberg University and then under the German director Erwin Pis ...
became the artistic director and dramaturge
A dramaturge or dramaturg (from Ancient Greek δραματουργός – dramatourgós) is a literary adviser or editor in a theatre, opera, or film company who researches, selects, adapts, edits, and interprets scripts, libretti, texts, and pr ...
of the Schauspielhaus, which caused controversy with his unconventional implementations of plays. He also began a close collaboration with classical philologist Wolfgang Schadewaldt
Wolfgang Schadewaldt (15 March 1900 in Berlin – 10 November 1974 in Tübingen) was a German classical philologist working mostly in the field of Greek philology and a translator. He also was a professor of University of Tübingen and Universi ...
, whose translations of Greek dramas he brought to the stage in Cologne. Heyme was replaced in 1979 by Jürgen Flimm
Jürgen Flimm (; 17 July 1941 – 4 February 2023) was a German theatre and opera director, theatre manager, and academic teacher. Flimm was first active in drama, and made the Thalia Theater in Hamburg one of the most successful German theatr ...
, and then in 1985 by Klaus Pierwoß. In 1989, Pierwoß was the first director, who brought the East German director Frank Castorf
Frank Castorf (born 17 July 1951 in East Berlin) is a German theater director and was the artistic director of the ''Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz'' from 1992 to 2015. His work is often associated with postdramatic theatre.
Biography
...
with a production of Hamlet to a West German theater. It was followed by the directors Torsten Fischer in 1990, Günter Krämer
Günter Krämer (born December 2, 1940) is a German stage director, especially for opera, and a theatre manager who has staged internationally.
Career
Born in Neustadt an der Weinstraße, Krämer studied German language and literature and gain ...
, Marc Günther and since 2007, Karin Beier
Karin Beier (born 1965 in Cologne) is a German theatre director.
Biography
After studying English in Cologne, Karin Beier moved into theatre. She established an English language theatre and staged Shakespeare plays in their source language. Th ...
. On 11 January 2013, Beier left before her move to the Deutsches Schauspielhaus
The Deutsches Schauspielhaus, sometimes referred to as the Hamburg Schauspielhaus or Hamburg Theatre, is a theatre in the St. Georg, Hamburg, St. Georg quarter of the city of Hamburg, Germany
History
The Deutsches Schauspielhaus was co-foun ...
, with her last production of an antique drama, ''The Trojan Women
''The Trojan Women'' (, lit. "The Female Trojans") is a tragedy by the Ancient Greece, Greek playwright Euripides, produced in 415 BCE. Also translated as ''The Women of Troy,'' or as its transliterated Greek title ''Troades, The Trojan Women'' ...
'' by Euripides
Euripides () was a Greek tragedy, tragedian of classical Athens. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. Some ancient scholars attributed ninety-five plays to ...
. It was based on the work of Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary criticism, literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th ...
.
Current theatre
As part of the opera renovation, the Schauspielhaus was again demolished and rebuilt between 2010 and 2013. Having withdrawn for reasons of cost of the new version so much that they hardly seemed to pay off, urged the citizens' initiative "Courage to culture. Contents in front of the facade "preserved the listed building and carried out a referendum, which was approved in April 2010 by the city council of Cologne. In June 2012, EXPO XXI was put into operation in the Agnesviertel on the Gladbacher Wall as an interim play stage during the renovation work. An information box, which was erected in October 2012, provided information about its building progress.
Rita Thiele has been chief dramatist and deputy director of the intendant and Patrick Wasserbauer is the managing director. Stefan Bachmann was appointed as ''Director of the House'' on 1 September 2013. Other current theatre directors include, Angela Richter, Rafael Sanchez and Moritz Sostmann.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Schauspiel Koln
Theatres in Cologne