Treffen junge Szene
Production
FRISCH gefragt!
junges RZt, RambaZamba Theater
Berlin
FRISCH gefragt!, junges RZt, RambaZamba Theater Berlin © Sascha Schlegel
Max Frisch’s questions are only the beginning: the young performers take them up, reshape them and develop their own – about dreams, doubts and contradictions. In this way, Max Frisch’s questionnaire becomes the starting point for a creative process that brings together personal and artistic forms of expression.
On stage, a collage emerges of text, movement, video, sound and visuals – and of big questions that deliberately remain open.
What do our answers reveal about us – and what about our questions? With his famous questionnaire, Max Frisch created a literary experiment that continues to resonate today: instead of certainties, it offers moments of disruption; instead of solutions, new perspectives on identity, responsibility and the self.
This is precisely where FRISCH gefragt! begins – the inclusive theatre project of the youth club at the RambaZamba Theatre. At its core is a collaboratively devised piece involving young people with and without disabilities, alongside two older women – an intergenerational dialogue that brings different life experiences and perspectives into exchange.
Frisch’s questions are only the starting point. The young participants take them up, twist them, challenge them – and develop their own questions, rooted in their lives, their doubts, dreams and contradictions. In this way, the questionnaire becomes a springboard for a creative process that connects personal and artistic forms of expression.
On stage, this results in a multi-layered collage of text, movement and multimedia elements such as video, sound and visuals. It explores big questions: would you like to be immortal? What is your greatest dream? Are you a friend to yourself? And also those questions that deliberately remain open.
Jury statement
With FRISCH gefragt!, an ensemble of 14 people from different generations and life experiences – with and without disabilities – brings a production to the stage that treats inclusion as a given.
Together, the ensemble sets out in search of one of the most pressing questions: who am I, and what makes me happy? The starting point is the questionnaire by the Swiss writer Max Frisch. In his literary work, he posed provocative and profound questions to his readers – about identity, connection and differing truths. For this ensemble, however, it serves above all as inspiration: an invitation to ask their own questions and discover new perspectives on themselves.
Their search for answers takes place where language reaches its limits – in the body, in movement, in dance, in encounter. Dance is what connects the performers: it is where they first met, and where they develop their shared form of expression.
The production unfolds through a range of constellations: in a silent disco, collective moments emerge that are intimate and harmonious. In solo, each person finds their own voice. In duets, conversations take place without words. In the group, something is woven that is greater than the sum of its parts.
The scenes are accompanied by electronic music that moves through the body, touching it and making emotion tangible. Again and again, the stage shifts into a dream-like sphere – a parallel space in which personal dreams, desires and memories can be shared without needing explanation.
Love, fears, hopes, conflicts and friendships all find space here, sustained by a remarkable sensitivity and care for one another. A space of trust emerges, one that allows vulnerability.
This is not about finding neat answers. On the contrary, it is about holding the question, continuing to ask, circling curiously around what defines us – again and again. Questioning can be unsettling – and that is precisely where its power lies: it has the capacity to open doors.
FRISCH gefragt! is a production that is both delicate and powerful. An evening that begins quietly and resonates long afterwards – because it does not send us away with certainties, but with an invitation to keep asking.
Mai-An Nguyen and Rahmatallah Ramzi
With
Elsa Ebeling, Anna Friedrichsen, D. B. Geißler, Amyli – G. von Gersdorff, Parastu Ghashghaie, Nadja Henß, Lara Alison Jaksch, Käthe Maj Selma Lange, Lotte Latscha, Hanna Nguyen, Ursula Raschke, Lukas Reitmeier, Niklas Ufer, Aila Wittig
Lillian Bocksch, Sascha Vajnstajn – Direction and stage
Val de Licer – Costumes
Fernando Balsera – Choreography
Laura Nitsch – Film
Frieder Blume – Sound
PPPANIK – Visuals
Petros Mandalos – Dramaturgy
Paulina Heyse and Erna Schmidt-Oehm – Assistance