»Theater heute« survey: Schauspielhaus Zürich wins main prizes

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Production design from "Simply the End of the World" with Benjamin Lillie: Actor of the year in the production of the year

Photo: Diana Pfammatter / Schauspielhaus Zürich

In a year that was extremely difficult for the theater scene due to the pandemic, the Schauspielhaus Zürich has proven itself particularly well from the point of view of critics.

There, the play “Juste la fin du monde” (Simply the end of the world) by the French playwright Jean-Luc Lagarce, who died in 1995, was the staging of the year.

Director Christopher Rüping turned it into a chamber play about identity conflicts, it was said on Thursday in the rating published by the Berlin specialist magazine »Theater heute«.

The play was also shown as a live stream from the Schauspielhaus Zurich at the Berlin Theatertreffen 2021.

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Prize winner Maja Beckmann

Photo: Diana Pfammatter / Schauspielhaus Zürich

There is even more reason to be happy in Zurich.

There, Maja Beckmann, known among others from the »Stromberg« series, plays the actress of the year.

From the point of view of criticism, she was convincing as sister-in-law in "Simply the End of the World".

Beside her, Benjamin played Lillie as Louis in the play, which earned him the award for Actor of the Year.

With a view to the Corona period, the editorial team did not include the Theater of the Year category in the annual survey.

Instead, they asked about the survivor of the year.

The most frequent answer of the 38 respondents was: "All".

The piece of the year comes from the German-Swiss author Sibylle Berg.

"And surely the world has disappeared with me" had an acclaimed premiere at the Gorki Theater in Berlin in October.

The material about the balance sheet of a generation in neoliberalism formed the conclusion of a four-part series of plays that Berg wrote for the theater.

The Deutsches Theater in Berlin can look forward to two awards for its production of Schiller's »Maria Stuart«.

The stage design by Judith Oswald was just as convincing as the costumes by Sibylle Wallum.

As the youngest author of the year, »Theater heute« records Ewe Benbenek, who was also awarded the Mülheim Dramatic Prize this year.

As the young director of the year, Cosmea Spelleken was convincing, with her collective Punktlive who had turned Goethe's “Sorrows of Young Werther” into a social media drama “Werther.live” that could only be visited digitally.

hpi / feb / dpa