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Outgoing Intendant Oberender: After ten years at the Berlin Festival
Photo: Jens Kalaene / picture alliance / dpa
Thomas Oberender, the director of the Berliner Festspiele, who is leaving the Berlin Festival at the end of the year after ten years in office, is accused by several employees of an allegedly toxic management style.
In an article in the ARD magazine »Kontraste« on Thursday evening, former subordinates accused him of exercising psychological pressure and reported »threatening behavior« and a very high workload.
At least three women from the festival apparatus suffered burnout.
Oberender denies the allegations.
He made employees cry and, even after they were on sick leave, harassed them with business inquiries, according to the television report produced by the RBB, among other things.
He also showed employees "little to no appreciation".
In a dossier, Charlotte Sieben, commercial director of the Berliner Festspiele, apparently summarized the allegations in the spring of this year after questioning former employees.
The dossier was then probably submitted to the then Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters, whose ministry is subordinate to the Berlin Festival.
When Oberender announced in the middle of the year that he would be leaving as head of the festival, although his contract had just been extended, it caused great astonishment in Berlin's cultural world.
Bad mood around the Schöngeist?
The cultural manager accused of abuse of power did not want to comment on the sometimes serious allegations in a lengthy telephone conversation with SPIEGEL.
He refers to a statement according to which he was never confronted with any complaints in his entire management.
In the capital's cultural scene, Oberender has so far been considered a beautiful spirit, a good speaker and a skilled puller.
His duties as head of the Berliner Festspiele included organizing the Berlin Theatertreffen and various music festivals.
In addition, the festival under Oberender's leadership was involved in individual projects such as the most recent spectacular ten-day art event "The Sun Machine is Coming Down" in the disused ICC congress center in Berlin, which caused quite a stir in the arts pages in October.
The allegations now made against Oberender are "the symptom of a structural crisis in the cultural scene," according to the "Berliner Zeitung". Most recently, only in the capital, Shermin Langhoff, the director of the Maxim Gorki Theater, Kay Wuschek, director of the Parkaue theater, and Klaus Dörr, head of the Berliner Volksbühne, were confronted with allegations of abuse of power. Wuschek and Dörr vacated their posts.
As a sign of a problematic working atmosphere in Oberender's house, among other things, a strong staff turnover is now seen. In a report by Deutschlandfunk, for example, it was stated that "every few months the position of the director's assistant was publicly advertised". The broadcaster also reports that "there should even have been coaching for upper tenders" - which is obviously classified as an indication of a bad mood.
Oberender, born in Jena in 1966, is also known as a book author.
In 2020 he published the work »Empowerment East - How we grow together«.
Before his job in Berlin, he was director of the Salzburg Festival's drama program for several years.
At the end of 2008 he caused a sensation with a termination that was later withdrawn.
At that time he accused his boss, the Salzburg artistic director Jürgen Flimm, of "bullying".
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