The play Mr. Puntila and his servant Matti by Bertolt Brecht with music by Paul Dessau and directed by Christina Tscharyiski will celebrate its premiere on 22 April 2023 at the Berliner Ensemble in the Großes Haus.
Fig.above: JR Berliner Ensemble – Sascha Nathan, Chor (hinten)
The estate owner Puntila suffers from himself, for his power and possessions leave him alone. That’s why he gets drunk and, while intoxicated, showers his employees with affection and promises of better working conditions; his servant Matti, a “good man”, should marry his daughter Eva, not some influential attaché. But then: always the next morning, sobriety, forgetting all that has been vowed – capital and the imperiousness of his class reign.
Bertolt Brecht’s comedy “Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti” (Mr. Puntila and his servant Matti) demonstrates the futile belief in the ability of the “benevolent capitalist” to reform. How long should one hope for a better world through the kindness of the powerful? At what point are those who maintain the system with their own hands responsible for standing up for themselves? “Who who?”, Brecht asks at the end: who fights whom, who exploits whom – and above all: who overthrows whom?
The Austrian-Bulgarian director Christina Tscharyiski has been invited several times to the Radikal jung Festival in Munich with her works. With her fourth production at the Berliner Ensemble, she continues her examination of political conditions after Brecht’s “Die Mutter” (2021) and Elfriede Jelinek’s “Schwarzwasser” (2021).
WHERE?
Berliner Ensemble
Bertolt-Brecht-Platz 1
10117 Berlin-Mitte
WHEN?
Premiere: Saturday, 22 April 2023, 7:30 pm
Further performances:
Sunday, 23 April 2023, 6:00 pm
Wednesday, 03 May 2023, 7:30 pm
Thursday, 04 May 2023, 7:30 pm
Saturday, 27 May 2023, 7:30 pm
Sunday, 28 May 2023, 6:00 pm
