Culture | Lightness in heavy seas

Scene from “Water for me, please” Photo: Neue Bühne Senftenberg/Steffen Rasche “For example, there in Lower Lusatia, the town on the hill. People are trying to build something new.” This is what a messenger of the gods says in the play “Im Mondschein” – premiered on the 80th anniversary of the Neue Bühne Senftenberg (NBS). The stage was founded on October 21, 1946 as the Senftenberg City Theater, initiated by the Soviet commander Ivan Soldierov. With the active support of the public, the gymnasium of a school was transformed into a theater hall in just four weeks. The first performance was a colorful evening, the first complete piece of Franz Lehár's operetta "Land des Smiles", the first play "Professor Mamlock" by Friedrich Wolf. The writer and doctor Friedrich Wolf wrote it in exile in 1933. “Professor Mamlock” tells the story of a Jewish doctor who is persecuted by the Nazis and shoots himself.

The later writer Erwin Strittmatter could not have meant "Professor Mamlock", but productions such as "Land of Smiles" certainly did when, as editor of the "Märkische Volksstimme" at the end of the 1940s, he criticized too much "bourgeois lightness", as Hans-Peter Rußiger noted in a short history of the Senftenberg Theater. But that's still harmless. After B. K. Tragelehn's production of Heiner Müller's "Die Umsiedlerin" was banned from a Berlin student theater, the Senftenberg Theater terminated the director without notice in 1961. Now SED officials are talking about “counter-revolutionary platform building.”

According to the NBS, the current premiere “Im Mondschein” draws “an arc from the ancient origins of the theater through the founding of the theater in Senftenberg to a possible future.” The setting is a surreal landscape between the park and the remains of an opencast mine. Senftenberg is located in the Lusatian lignite mining area. In 1959 the city theater was renamed the Miners' Theater. At that time it was not just any provincial theater and was able to maintain its special position. In 1958, 1972 and 1977 it received the Hans Otto Prize. Critics voted it “Theater of the Year” for the 2005/2006 season. This was a sensation when you consider who else received this honor: the Vienna Burgtheater, the Munich Kammerspiele, the Hamburg Schauspielhaus and from Berlin, among others, the Volksbühne at Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz.

The Volksbühne was "Theater of the Year" in 2016 and 2017 with its then director Frank Castorf - and after studying theater studies, he earned his first spurs in Senftenberg in 1976 and made his debut as a director there in 1978. The Miners' Theater was also a springboard for some well-known actors such as Annekathrin Bürger, Günter Schubert and Armin Mueller-Stahl.

»The Neue Bühne Senftenberg is much more than a theater, it is a piece of lived Lusatian identity.«

“The Neue Bühne Senftenberg is much more than a theater, it is a piece of lived Lusatian identity,” enthuses Brandenburg’s State Secretary for Culture Tobias Dünow (SPD). The theater has mastered upheavals, reinvented itself again and again and always held on to the importance of culture even in difficult times. It is an ambassador for the region. “This was made possible by the many people who stand behind this theater: outstanding artists, witty theater teachers, a director with vision and supporters who support the stage with passion and energy even after the curtain has fallen,” says Dünow. He wished the traditional and forward-looking Neue Bühne to continue to have such committed companions in the future.

In order for the NBS to have a future, it needs financial security. The Ministry of Culture is giving 4.1 million euros this year. The Oberspreewald-Lausitz district is contributing 1.45 million euros, the city of Senftenberg 520,000 euros.

In "Im Mondschein" (director: Florian Hein), the protagonist Quincy, played by Lena Conrad, roams through classics such as Georg Büchner's "Woyzeck" and William Shakespeare's comedy "A Midsummer Night's Dream." Characters from “Water for me, please” also appear. “Water for me please” is the second premiere on the occasion of the 80th birthday. This piece was commissioned from Oliver Bukowski, who had already written a piece for his 70th birthday. In the comedy “Water for me please,” director Mirko Böttcher and the ensemble poke fun at themselves in a friendly way. A theater troupe has no plan on how to celebrate an anniversary in a way that will please, not least, a loyal, 86-year-old audience member. They rehearse, they argue. These conflicts between each other reveal conflicts in society. What's outside doesn't stop at the rehearsal room. Sentences like: "Shouldn't we do something relaxed and funny?" In a dialogue, someone interjects: "If everything is supposed to be so big and pop, why is young dramaturg Peter given the direction?" And the annoyed question "Can we finally continue working now?" is answered with a resounding "Yes."

It could just as well be: “Yes, please!” Because the NBS is needed. At an appointment to renovate and expand the workshop in the summer of 2024, Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke (SPD) said: "Even if the ship is on course, it is still in heavy seas." He was referring to the fact that the AfD had received 31.8 percent in the local elections in Oberspreewald-Lausitz. Theater work strengthens democracy, assured director Daniel Ris. “We actively resist right-wing extremism and ethnic ideology.” But in the federal election in February 2025 it was already 41.2 percent.

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