The Man Outside

by Wolfgang BorchertPremiere on 5 October 2024Schauspielhaus, Großes HausSchauspiel

Dates

https://www.dhaus.de/ Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus Gustaf-Gründgens-Platz 1, 40211 Düsseldorf
Sat, 28.12. / 19:30 – 21:15
Schauspiel2:1 Weihnachtsaktion
by Wolfgang Borchert Direction: Adrian Figueroa
Schauspielhaus, Großes Haus
https://www.dhaus.de/ Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus Gustaf-Gründgens-Platz 1, 40211 Düsseldorf
Mon, 13.01. / 19:30 – 21:15
Schauspiel
by Wolfgang Borchert Direction: Adrian Figueroa
Schauspielhaus, Großes Haus
https://www.dhaus.de/ Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus Gustaf-Gründgens-Platz 1, 40211 Düsseldorf
Fri, 31.01. / 19:30 – 21:15
Schauspiel
by Wolfgang Borchert Direction: Adrian Figueroa
Schauspielhaus, Großes Haus
We regularly publish new dates.

About the play

Sergeant Beckmann returns home from the war. This »relentless plague« has left him exhausted and world-weary. However, not only the man returning home has changed, home itself is no longer what it was: his child has been killed by a bomb, his marriage is ruined, his parents who loyally supported the regime have taken their own lives and the Colonel doesn’t want to know about Beckmann’s mental injuries. Traumatised, he is left to come to terms on his own with the feelings of responsibility he has for the death of his former comrades in a world where he no longer feels at home.

Wolfgang Borchert, an opponent of the Nazis, died in 1947. He based »The Man Outside« on his own experiences as a soldier during World War Two. At the same time the play, which he wrote with feverish intensity in a few days, raises universal questions. It catalogues the mental state of someone who is haunted by war, his relationships with other people and the collapse of his faith in the world.

The director Adrian Figueroa, who recently directed »The Fire Raisers« and »Work and Structure« for Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, and his team will relate these issues to the present today.

Besetzung

Beckmann Raphael Gehrmann
The Other Sonja Beißwenger
A Colonel Florian Lange
A Cabaret Director Thiemo Schwarz
Frau Kramer Claudia Hübbecker
A Street Sweeper Markus Danzeisen
Direction Adrian Figueroa
Stage Design Irina Schicketanz
Costume Design Malena Modéer
Music Ketan Bhatti
Video Benjamin Krieg
Collaboration Video Elena Tilli
Light Konstantin Sonneson

Dauer

1 hour 45 minutes — no break

Trailer

Press comments

The way the stage technology works here is magnificent, with Irina Schicketanz's creepy stage set of dark, movable living quarters acting as a nightmare landscape, constantly rising, falling and turning on the artfully moving revolving stage and the characters constantly transforming into grimaces and distorted images thanks to video editing. A huge battle of philosophical concepts has been staged here, a psychogram of human downfall, an impressive interior view of a soul that has become ill. A disturbing evening well worth seeing.
nachtkritik.de, 07.10.2024