Peter Stein comes to the Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer

The founders of the Schaubühne were rooted in the sixties left wing student movement. Their aim was to run a socially engaged and critical theatre with a distinct (left wing) political bias. It was an idea fitting the spirit of social protest (among others, against the War in Vietnam) that eventually would lead to the upheavals of 1969. The Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer was also grounded in Germany’s strong political theatre tradition featuring such exponents as Brecht and Piscator. This was also visible in the Schaubühne’s choice of plays, most notably the dramas of Brecht, Horváth, Sternheim, Weiss and Lange. The company performed in an old factory building in Kreuzberg. Kreuzberg was far removed from the commercial centre of Berlin and an area dominated by progressive students, squatters and others. It suited the radical left-wing theatre of the Schaubühne. There is comparatively little information on the activities of the Schaubühne prior to 1970, when Peter Stein joined the company. He brought with him a company of outstanding actors and his skilled scenographer, Herrmann. It is perhaps right to say that the history of the Schaubühne really started in 1970 with Stein and his actors (and later the second director, Grüber).

It was Stein who saved the Schaubühne from obscurity and projected this experimental fringe-theatre right into the epicentre of contemporary German theatre life. At least, this is the view held by most critics who invariably start their writings on the Schaubühne in 1970. To some critics, Stein was the Schaubühne; according to Luk Van den Dries, for example (in Etcetera 8, 1984, 14), the story of the Schaubühne is the story of Peter Stein. Of course, this view does no justice to the efforts of the entire company and the oustanding professional quality of all its members. However, one must admit that Stein was very important to the Schaubühne. What follows here, is a short account of how Stein and his company came to the Schaubühne, and how the theatre at the Halleschen Ufer developed since 1970.

Stein started off his career as a director in 1967, when Kortner invited him to the Münchener Kammerspiele. In Munich, Stein staged Edward Bond’s play Gerettet (Saved) in a Bavarian tongue with many references to contemporary Germany. The German theatre magazine Theater Heute declared Gerettet the performance of the year. It was a remarkable start.

Stein’s next production was Brecht’s Im Dickicht der Städte. His third one - the staging of Weiss’ Vietnam Diskurs – ended Stein’s Munich engagement. Perhaps it was not so much the performance itself, but rather the fact that after the performance the actors collected for the Vietcong that caused a big row. The Kammerspiele intendant (theatre manager), Everding, dismissed Stein. However, Stein had already established his reputation. Kurt Hübner of the Bremer Theatre asked him to stage Goethe’s Torquato Tasso in 1969. Hübner was a progressive intendant; among others, he introduced the principle of staging fewer productions per season in order to increase their quality, a principle also adopted by Stein at the Schaubühne.

In Bremen, Stein met some actors that would be very important for the future Schaubühne. They all shared an ideological basis and would follow Stein to Berlin: among others Bruno Ganz, Jutta Lampe, Edith Clever and Werner Rehm. He also met Klaus Michael Grüber who in Bremen had been given the chance to direct his first production, in that same year, 1969. Together with Stein’s, Grüber’s productions would dominate the Schaubühne in the years to come.

Stein and his actors shared a common dissatisfaction with the structure of the German theatre. The public theatres were very bureaucratic; they were managed by an intendant, appointed by the (local or national) authorities that also financed the theatre (the German theatre subsidies were, and are, among the highest in Europe). As a consequence, in many cases, gaining the leadership of a theatre involved status and politics rather than intrinsic qualities as a theatre manager. Moreover, it was a rigid and hierarchical system. In the 1960’s, theatre people contested the traditional hierarchy and the autocratic position of the intendant. There were many calls for democracy, and participation of the members of the companies. Actors demanded the right to have a say in the choice of plays. It was a slow process, to which the Schaubühne would contribute considerably. However, the foundations of the famous democratic structure of the company were really laid in Bremen. In the Bremen Theatre, a conflict was going on between the management and the actors. The latter demanded the right to participate in important decisions. They also asked for an opportunity to develop productions as a collective. Stein and the Tasso-actors tried to continue this debate with the audience on the night of the first Tasso (March 3^rd, 1969) but the Bremer dramaturg cut them off. It showed that it was not easy to overthrow the traditional hierarchy and the Bremen failure was emblematic for the situation at the time.

The Bremer Tasso was very much rooted in contemporary society. According to the theatre critic Iden, the performance expressed a profound doubt about the actual possibilities of art to change social relationships in the real world: ‘Erlebnisse der eigenen Ohnmacht wurden zu bestimmenden Erfahrung der Epoche. In Steins Tasso war diese Erfahrung gegenwärtig’: The feeling of powerlessness dominates our time. In Stein’s Tasso, this feeling was present (Iden, 1979, 24). The production was very successful throughout Europe, though Stein would later on renounce his interpretation and staging of 1969. The very year, he left Bremen for Zürich and he took many of the Tasso-actors with him.

At the Zürcher Schauspielhaus, he directed several plays among which Edward Bond’s Early Morning (1969). However, problems arose between the new actors from Bremen and the resident Zürich performers. Moreover, some of these actors and part of the audience had difficulties with Stein’s style. So Stein had to leave again, now heading for Frankfurt with his company. In Frankfurt, a serious attempt was made to integrate the company into the existing structure by proposing a co-directorship of Stein, Claus Peymann and Dieter Reible but the local authorities and the intendant rejected the proposal. Instead, Berlin offered Stein the leadership of the Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer.

The original Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer had been a small private theatre, operating without subsidies and completely independent from the authorities. However, in 1970 the city of West Berlin invited Peter Stein to the Schaubühne. They made it clear that they were prepared to finance the experiment. To get Stein to Berlin was important in the context of the battle for cultural prestige with the East German theatres. It would turn out to be a fertile symbiotic relationship: the Berlin authorities gave Stein and the others the opportunity to develop and grow, and to become important. The importance of the Schaubühne, in turn, helped Berlin to restore its position as a leading theatre city.

The Schaubühne am Halleschen Ufer introduced some revolutionary changes, such as the collective structure of the company, and the quality of their productions set a standard. They became increasingly influential throughout Europe.