Mephisto

The actor Hendrik Höfgen is about to ascend to the peak of his career: he joins the Prussian State Theatre in Berlin, performs brilliantly as Mephistopheles in Goethe’s Faust and is ultimately appointed Artistic Director by the Prime Minister. But his elevation has its price: Höfgen makes a pact with the Nazi regime and becomes caught up in the role of a lifetime. Klaus Mann’s novel Mephisto is seen as a seminal work of post-war literature, examining the actions and responsibilities of the individual in an authoritarian regime and inspired by real lives. All the action in Jette Steckel’s haunting and intelligent production takes place inside the theatre. This highlights the role of artists in the theatre system and produces a feast of acting: the ensemble is in top form, led by Thomas Schmauser in a sophisticated and memorable performance: a genuine event that enables us to see the main character’s internal conflicts.

Jury Statement

“Jette Steckel and her team have succeeded in creating an evening that shapes Klaus Mann’s novel Mephisto plus a few lines added from other sources into a trenchant and topical study of the relationship between art and power. Thomas Schmauser offers a virtuoso portrayal of Hendrik Höfgen’s transformation from the pioneer of a ‘revolutionary theatre’ to an opportunistic Nazi favourite motivated by a mixture of artistic vanity and some residual ideas about resistance. He carefully explores the character from the inside, showing him to be flawed, argumentative and/or acting being argumentative. That Steckel shows even this evening’s domestic scenes as a play within a play is entirely consistent. This is a portrait of a human type to whom art means the world, one committed to the illusion that the theatre is a refuge that will ultimately remain inviolate. No way! Watching this superb ensemble at work, we see people whom the New Right would be only too happy to exclude from the stage. This alignment between the historical past and the potential future really hurts.”
– Sabine Leucht for the Theatertreffen-jury

Tothe video statement (in German)

DigitalProgramme Booklet on the website of Münchner Kammerspiele (in German)