Situation Rooms

How can the theatre talk about war? Not about the distant Trojan wars, but about those of today? Rimini Protokoll adopt an entirely new method: They send their audience on an intricate obstacle course, almost as complex as the interconnections of the international arms trade. The world shrinks, not virtually, but quite literally: A trade fair for security technology is only one door away from a hospital tent run by “Doctors without borders” in Sierra Leone. Spectators are steered through the labyrinth by remote control, just like pilots in modern warfare, holding a tablet computer in their hands. Like an ego shooter in a video game, they take on the narrator’s perspective. But: the perspective changes. From arms lobbyist to peace activist, from Syrian refugee to Israeli soldier, from perpetrator to victim. Again and again we encounter other people in this system, all following their own logic. “Situation rooms” renders tangible what usually stays abstract: Every war today is integrated into global economy.

Documentary box from 4 May 2014
in the Haus der Berliner Festspiele
www.rimini-protokoll.de