Artistic director Wagner Carvalho, dramaturge Fabian Larsson, set designer Leonie Brüggenwerth and costume designer Mathieu Amadou from Ballhaus Naunynstraße talk to Christine Wahl about a new learning and exchange format that will be launched at the theater in October thanks to the prize money from the Theaterpreis des Bundes. 

Wagner Carvalho and Fabian Larsson, when Ballhaus Naunynstraße was awarded the Theaterpreis des Bundes last year and was thus also €200,000 richer, you immediately had a clear investment idea. “We want to continue our writing workshop for new post-migrant theater texts,” you said. Did you stick to this plan? 

Wagner Carvalho: In principle, yes, but we have expanded the idea a little. The workshop will not be limited to supporting authors, but also include funding for lighting, dramaturgy, sound, directing, set design and costume. We have a lot of career changers working for us who, when they start here, are often not yet so familiar with the various disciplines and trades in the theater. Jens Schneider, our technical director, already has one or two gray hairs because of this (laughs). 

Fabian Larsson: The fact that we see ourselves as an institution that supports young talent and career changers is part of our theater’s self-image – especially because the barriers to entry at other institutions are quite high. It starts with the fact that some people simply cannot afford an unpaid internship. Or – a classic example – actors and actresses who are Black or POC and who always play the same limited roles on German television at some point feel the need to do something different and start writing. However, there are not really great opportunities for this kind of career change in Germany. 

What exact form will the workshops take?   

Larsson: We want to bring those who are just starting out in their respective fields together with people who already have experience: a learning and exchange model similar to our writing workshop “Unconventional Signs – new post-migrant theater literature.” Specifically, our idea is to form relatively large teams with two people each for writing, two for dramaturgy, set and costume design and several performers who all work together on a project. This is supplemented by workshops: For example, we spend three days working on the lighting, and these days are not just open to lighting designers, but to everyone on the team. We have a relatively large number of actors at the theater who have mainly only worked in film and television before. And lighting in the theater is really completely different from film, so you have to deal with that. 

So, the workshop offers a practice-oriented high-speed career entry alternative to traditional acting and theater training? 

Larsson: In fact, the theater world is still very exclusive, because in order to be able to work in it, you usually have to have gone through these training institutions you’re talking about and become a professional in that way. However, many schools that prepare you really well for the job market are themselves already exclusive. You have to have a specific cultural capital that is relatively narrowly defined: It makes a difference whether or not you have already read Schiller with your parents; many other capabilities that applicants bring with them instead don’t count in this context. 

Carvalho: I would like to come back to lighting technology and lighting design. This is an aspect that everyone who has been working here at the Ballhaus for a while knows: When Wagner comes, he will definitely find it too dark. Because there are non-white people on stage here, and you first have to understand that those with a different skin tone need to be lit in a different way. You can sometimes see this on TV talk shows where different people are sitting on the podium: There, people with darker skin appear less visible than others. There were huge arguments about this within the theater because I always said: This is not about the art of lighting, but about the fact that the people standing on the stage here need to be seen! However, many lighting technicians and designers – regardless of whether they are white or people of color – have not yet had this experience in their professional practice before they come to us. This kind of sensitization is also an important part of the work we do here. 

Larsson: In the context of lighting technology and lighting design, this is actually particularly impressive. American cinema already had this discussion 15 years ago. The more Black actors that had successful careers, the more useless previous lighting standards became. And the more politically organized the actors were, the more intense the disagreements in Hollywood became. In the theater, however, this debate has still not really arrived. The contrast between skin color and costume and set design also plays a decisive role. For example, we work quite a lot with black or white stage floors – which of course reflect the light so differently that this color decision influences all subsequent areas. And again, that’s not something I find in books, but is knowledge gained from experience, which is passed on in our workshop, for example. 

When are you planning to start? 

Carvalho: In October. The money has been in our account since February – and that’s an absolutely fantastic feeling (laughs)! We’re really looking forward to this discussion in our workshops, especially as we can also invite colleagues who started their careers here at the theater and who are now firmly established in the German literary and theater world to provide input; I’m thinking of Sasha Marianna Salzmann, Nurkan Erpulat or Hakan Savaş Mican, for example. But regardless of who will actually be there in the end, it’s important to us to create a space where you can try out things that are generally not possible elsewhere. 

Mathieu Amadou, you have already designed the costumes for several Ballhaus Naunynstraße productions and will be taking part in the first workshop in October. What exactly are these things that Wagner Carvalho is talking about? 

Mathieu Amadou: For me, it’s crucial that you’re trusted here to really just try things out and indeed take risks. I actually come from the fashion industry and have worked in the theater before, but that was really ages ago, and it wasn’t easy for me to pick up where I left off at the beginning. However, I had a great team: Everyone was super young and incredibly open, which really took a load off my mind. In the past, during my internships at larger theaters, I often had to deal with people who already had a certain standing and were perhaps not so open to new ideas. Here at the Ballhaus, on the other hand, it’s possible to come together and find something in common – which ultimately benefits both sides, the performers as well as me. 

Leonie Brüggenwerth, you will also be taking part in the workshop in October. You studied architecture and have just designed your very first stage set: for the production “Kraftwandler*innen” by the akademie der autodikaten, directed by Raphael Moussa Hillebrand here at Ballhaus Naunynstraße. What led you from architecture to theater? 

Leonie Brüggenwerth: Actually, my architecture degree at the Glasgow School of Art was just a means to an end (laughs). I had already worked as a set design assistant in film in Berlin before my studies and I just wanted to study something solid, so architecture was a good compromise. I had actually just finished my Master’s degree and was writing my first applications when I met Mathieu – who had already helped me with my application portfolio for the architecture degree. When he asked me why I wasn’t applying to the Ballhaus, it suddenly struck me as a great idea. 

So, you got in touch with Naunynstraße – and were then able to immediately join the “Kraftwandler*innen”? 

Brüggenwerth: The fact that I was extended this trust here, even though I had never designed a stage set before, was a huge opportunity for me! Even more so as everyone was in contact with me, supported me and gave me space to talk. 

Larsson: Incidentally, this is also an important aspect of our decision to use the Theaterpreis money to move a little further away from the classic writing workshop and the associated “product” idea: If theater is to have any relevance, the processes have to be changed. Society is currently hardening, the rhetoric is becoming militarized, social exclusion and violence are on the rise, and against this backdrop, opening up a space where people can come together for longer periods of time and exchange experiences has a more lasting effect than a single production. Because if we change the processes, we also discover other content – content that is directly related to us and to these conflicts and feelings of this society at a crossroads. That’s what makes the workshop practice so central for us. 

Leonie Brüggenwerth and Mathieu Amadou, are there any specific aspects that you each want to work on in the workshop? 

Brüggenwerth: I can think of two things off the top of my head. First, I would be extremely interested in experimenting with the element of water on stage. And second, I wonder how you could construct stage sets that create more moments of surprise and change in a theater production – for example, because an element suddenly opens up somewhere. Especially for people like me who are just starting out, workshops like this are of course extremely important – also to learn what might not be possible, be it technically or financially (laughs).   

Amadou: I’ve found that I particularly enjoy working on performances because the costume often has a completely different character than in classical acting. In performance, the costume is usually more experimental and changes more over the course of the performance. It is stretched and widened by certain movements, gets sweat stains – it plays along with the performer, so to speak, and afterwards you can see that the performer has exerted themselves in it. I find that exciting and would like to think further about this aspect; to look at the costume in a more interdisciplinary way: How can it continue into the props, for example, and practically become a performance itself?   

Brüggenwerth: But the most important thing is actually how you are supported here! This also increases your self-confidence. You feel encouraged when you leave the house and go home after the rehearsal: Yes, we exist and our stories are important!