Linkerhand
Linkerhand
»Franziska is not a ›fight the battles along the way‹ heroine; she comes full of brilliant plans to this city where there’s nothing but sober arithmetic, quick and cheap construction (...) and now I am trying to get hold of all the people I can get my hands on to learn about the extent to which the architecture of a city shapes its inhabitants’ attitude toward life, and it seems to me that it contributes to the formation of the soul just as much as literature and painting, music, philosophy...« Brigitte Reimann, from her diaries and correspondence
»Why shouldn’t I enjoy my life? In ten or twenty years, everything will be over,« writes Brigitte Reimann, who was just 22 years old at the time, in her diary. And before she could turn 40, everything really would be over. She dies of cancer. Nevertheless, in her last novel, which would become a cult favourite, she created a sister »in spirit«, who lives on to this day. A merciless lover much like the author, the young architect Franziska Linkerhand chooses, after the »Wall«, the workers’ state of the GDR over her bourgeois origins. A character who polarizes, who hates, in all systems, the »flag-wavers«, »mediocre and cowardly idiots«. She is vital, rough, open, and hard for the real-existing patriarchy to bear. Moved by the dream of an advanced and yet social architecture, Franziska decides against a brilliant career and chooses the reality of Neustadt instead. This model of both functional and »beautiful socialist city«, the great experiment, quickly deteriorates, however, into the site of the »organised blunder«.
What drives the young architect is the love–hate relationship with construction sites, planning offices, the drunken nights, the men and women, the restlessly dangerous world of work and workers.
Sebastian Baumgarten reconstructs Franziska Linkerhand from different perspectives as a modern, contemporary female figure who neither wants nor is able to adapt to the constraints of life without a fight. On a stage designed by architect Sam Chermayeff, her dream is renegotiated, the dream of the »need to dream« that won’t come to an end as long as we keep moving.
WATCH THE TRAILER
Premiere 18/October 2024
Foto: Esra Rotthoff
Stage photos: Ute Langkafel
Trailer: Schnittmenge
Web
Cast
»Es geht ums Bauen. Ums Bauen von Häusern und das Bauen einer besseren Welt. Und so wird die Bühne oft selbst zum Protagonisten: zur Baustelle etwa, auf derSam Chermayeff, der im richtigen Leben passenderweise selbst Architekt […] ist, immer wieder ein Ballett der Bauteile choreografieren lässt.«
Esther Slevogt, nachtkritik.de»[Sebastian Baumgarten] erinnert sich an ›die Angst und die Träume, die damals zerstört wurden‹, eine unterbrochene Zukunft. Das, so möchte ›Linkerhand‹ vermitteln, ist aus den Bau-Utopien der 60er und 70er geworden.«
Elena Philipp, Berliner Morgenpost
»Die Metaphorik liegt auf der Hand: Gerungen wir hier nicht nur um humanen Städtebau, sondern um die Architektur der Gesellschaft schlechthin.Das ist auch der Punkt, derSebastian Baumgartenin seiner Inszenierung am Maxim Gorki Theater interessiert. Die Bühne, die mit dem Sam Chermayeff Office ein Architekturbüro entworfen hat, versprüht universellen Baustellen-Charme: Türen hängen vom Schnürboden, Fertigteilhäuserfronten werden hin und her bewegt.«
Christine Wahl, Tagesspiegel
Maxim Gorki Theater
Stage:
Gorki Theater
Am Festungsgraben 2
10117 Berlin