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Berlin International Performing Arts Center

Blog Archive

Harrende Räume und Trotzende Menschen

“When a man is just born, he is weak and flexible. When he dies, he is hard and insensitive. When a tree is growing, it’s tender and pliant. But when it’s dry and hard, it dies. Hardness and strength are death’s companions.” Andrej Tarkovsky, Stalker, USSR, 1979

In this performance, three dancers and a beatboxer make the struggle against the adversities of a paralyzing world physically tangible. The piece questions of the relationship between physical and mental forces as well as how human beings bundle their strengths in order to move beyond their own limits.

The combination of martial arts, krump, dance, live sounds and the given as well as sculpted space create a dense atmosphere and images for which each audience member creates their own contexts, evoking memories of one’s own physical condition and experiences.

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Stuck In Orbit

A Space Drama | A Science FACTion Tale

Imagine: You were launched into space at the height of the Cold War – 30 years ago. Your space station is a secret collaboration with your archenemy. Then the Iron Curtain fell and your space agencies conveniently forgot about you and your co-commander from the opposite side. The two of you have struggled for mental and physical survival ever since.

Theater, visual art and sound design meet in this intense exploration of outer and inner space.

post theater has created a situation in which the politics and psychology of the 20th century’s former East and former West, pessimism and optimism, meet in the form of two juxtaposed characters. The fictitious international space station PACE becomes a battleground of philosophies and beliefs. .

For many years, post theater has been working on post-documentary performances, blending intense research with fiction. Stuck in Orbit follows a series of reflections of Soviet era utopianism. The space race, at the height of the Cold War, was a combination of soft power diplomacy and military threat. Not too long ago, this felt nearly anachronistic. Currently, with raising nationalism and the emerging superpower China, this has gained a strange sense of contemporariness. Space has again become a battleground for geopolitical conflicts.

Stuck in Orbit is post theater’s first collaboration with ETB | IPAC. It is performed in English with German subtitles.

Post-performance discussions will be offered on May 10 with Johannes Weppler, a space aviation expert of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Luft- und Raumfahrt and on May 11 and May 16 with the artists of the production.

post theater is an interdisciplinary performing arts unit without an ensemble. Projects range from theater to dance, multimedia performances to installations. Reoccurring themes are identity, resources and technology. The creative, haptic and original usage of video projections is a key component to the company’s work. post theater was founded in 1999 in New York, moved its headquarters to Berlin in 2002, opened a Tokyo branch in 2005 and one in Stuttgart in 2010. post theater has presented more than 50 works at festivals and arts institutions in 50 cities in 20 countries (e.g. Bangkok, Barcelona, Belgrade, Berlin, Cologne, Ljubljana, Milan, Munich, New York, Salamanca, Singapore, Seoul, Taipei, Tokyo, Vienna, Yokohama, Zagreb, Zurich). Hiroko Tanahashi and Max Schumacher are the artistic co-directors. In addition to the artistic work, post theater also gives lectures and workshops at art institutions and universities worldwide. post theater has won many awards, for example the Bremer Autorenpreis (2004 & 2011) and the Stuttgart Theater Award (2015 & 2017).

BIYT LAB – The Time Machine Team

A fast-paced adventure story filled with twists and turns

After an apocalyptic energy crisis, an odd group of specialists are brought together to create a machine which can transport them back into time. Their mission: solve the energy problem and repair time itself. No big deal, right? Wrong. This seemingly impossible task must be completed or the planet is doomed. The team just might have a chance, if they could only get along. Unfortunately, their personal differences are so extreme that discord threatens to destroy what little chance they have of survival.

This is very first public performance of an original play written completely by the 2019 BIYT Lab group, whose members are between the ages of 11 and 14.

It’s That Time of the Month PLUS SIZE

This improvised live talk show hosted by Berlin’s funniest women is coming to English Theatre Berlin | International Performing Arts Center for a one-time engagement!

Don’t miss it as these seven unscripted comedians from six different countries take the stage to improvise about topics close to their hearts and dish out life advice on all things necessary.

Same outrageous cast. Same hilarious show. This time in a bigger venue with more prizes.

Comedians: Andrea Björk Andresdottir, Antonia Bär, Caroline Clifford, Matilde Keizer, Marisa Llamas, Janina Rook, Nicole Ratjen

Impro 2019

Improvised theater is surprising and always different at the same time.

IMPRO, the international impro festival hosted by Die Gorillas, is one of the biggest festivals of its kind: for the 17th edition from March 16 – 24, 2019, improvisers from all over the world get together in Berlin to inspire the audience with their spontaneous stories and diverse characters. The artists will sweep them off their feet with their concepts and ideas of improvised theater which go in the most different of directions to show the variety and possibilities of this special art form: Storytelling inspired by Aki Kaurismäki, Shakespeare or a local playwright, improvisers giving very personal insights in Role Models, Meta Impro and Community, an improvised radio play, the Improvision Song Contest and much more is going to happen in five theaters around Berlin.

IMPRO 2019 brings new shows and presents improv classics.

Stunning. Emotional. Connecting.

Community

March 16, 17 and 18 |  8pm

“Life in contemporary forms of capitalism is becoming unbearable, and one survival strategy is to develop and protect at all costs small communities that offer us different relations. With art, we cannot and do not aim at causing great social change but we can make room for collective creation, a space where it is possible to survive and even have a good time. Every moment is worth asking the very important human question of ‘How do we actually want to live together?’. And by doing so, we are finding answers along the way. Exquisite and daring performers from different cultural, economic and political environments dive into the topic of community.”

Maja Dekleva Lapajne, Artistic Director of the EU project Our Lives and the format Community

Theatersports

March 19 | 8pm

Sometimes it’s nice to go back to the roots. Many of those looking for new improv formats today started with this popular form of improvising back in the day. Several teams compete for the best scenes and songs, for the audience doesn’t just make suggestions, it also decides the champion of the night. It’s no coincidence this show format succeeded all over the world: it’s improv full of fun, imagination, suspense, speed and passion…

Not by Kaurismäki

March 20 and 21 | 8pm

The concise manner of speaking and the quiet humor of Aki Kaurismäki is the model for the improvisations. And we‘re getting back to basics.

Not by Shakespeare

March 22 and 23 | 8pm

It goes without saying that we won’t be able to improvise a play which matches the works of the British genius. But we can let ourselves be inspired by William Shakespeare and use the rhythm of his language as well as the structure of his dramas, comedies and tragedies as a template. A Shakespeare play about gentrification, digitalization or factory farming – that could be pretty cool.

 

GLB – Improv Comedy

GLB bring their show to the ETB | IPAC stage for a behemoth evening of improvised scenes weaved together with incomparable timing and gut-wrenching laughter.

 

Plus, they’re bringing some of their friends along!

 

Pretty much anything can happen, and it’s all made up before your very eyes by some of the best improvisers this city has to offer.

 

GLB is Berlin’s longest running English-language longform improv team. They perform every 1st & 3rd Friday at the Comedy Café Berlin. Formed in 2013 as Good Luck, Barbara, GLB is one of the first teams to bring North American-style longform improv to the German Hauptstadt, and has been performing continuously since then – from claustrophobic basement bars to ETB | IPAC here in Berlin, and the massive Del Close Marathon in New York City and SlapDash in London. GLB members teach improv through The CCB Training School and have trained a new generation of fantastic improvisers right here in Berlin. They are Nicole Ratjen, Josh Telson and Noah Telson.

 

Parataxe – International Literature

What languages does Berlin write in? Berlin authors who pen their work in languages other than German are invited to take part in conversations, readings and new translations. On March 26th, PARATAXE presents Tomer Gardi (Israel/Berlin) and Ana Ristović (Serbia/Berlin), hosted by Martin Jankowski.

Tomer Gardi was born in the kibbutz Dan in Galiläa in 1974. When Gardi read in “broken German”, completely forgoing grammar and spelling at the Bachmannpreis event in 2016, his text and its use of hybrid-language caused vehement discussions among the jury. Following his very successful novel with the same title (Broken German), he now presents his newest book.

Ana Ristović was born 1972 in Belgrade, Serbia. She has published nine books of poetry, several of them award-winning. Her poem “Round Zero” was chosen by an international jury, curated by The Guardian, as one of the best love poems of the past 50 years.

PARATAXE is a project of the Berliner Literarische Aktion e.V. and is supported by the Berlin Senate Administration for Culture and Europe. Further information can be found at www.stadtsprachen.de.

The Lab: Wer ist Medea?

Wer ist Medea?/ Who is Medea?/ Quem é Medeia?

How can we interpret a classic of dramatic literature in 2019? Why work with classics at all? Let’s go back…to the beginnings…and let’s start with a universally despised woman.

Wer ist Medea? is a music theater performance as well as a spoken word concert, manifesto, choreography, emotional rehearsal, a tragic monologue or maybe just an homage to all those women that are hated just because their stories were written by men.

This performance is the very first presentation of a work-in-progress, the first interaction with an audience. In between the many layers of performance, constructed upon the interpretations of a variety of authors, we work as archaeologists to understand and unearth Medea.

Who is Medea? The personification of one of the most heinous crimes imaginable, a mother who kills her own children? Or the woman who sees her children being murdered by her enemies? The cruel and cold woman that betrayed her own father, the king, killed her brother and abandoned her own country in the name of love? Or a strong and independent woman that serves as an existential threat to patriarchal society? A woman blinded by her thirst of revenge or the victim of an ambitious and unscrupulous man? A mother that in a final act of love chooses to deliver her children to the embrace of death instead of leaving them in the hands of her cruel enemies?

Join us and find out.

An attempt to create a new dramaturgy inspired by the mythological character Medea, herself the subject of a myriad of different authors who wrote about her, reinvented her and imagined her, including Euripides, Heiner Müller, Christa Wolf, Chico Buarque and Paulo Pontes.

Performed in English, German and Portuguese

The Land of Milk(y) and Honey?

Israelis in Berlin

Following completely sold-out initial runs in the fall of 2018 and winter of 2019, we are very pleased to offer these six encore performances.

LIMITED SEATING: Please note that there are only 50 tickets available for each performance!

“I pity those who no longer remember the Holocaust and abandon Israel for a pudding.”

This statement, made by Yair Shamir, then Israeli Minister of Agriculture, to the Jerusalem Post in October of 2014, marked the climax of the so-called “Milky protest”. In a post that launched a thousand ships, the Facebook page Olim L’Berlin (Aliyah to Berlin) urged Israelis to move to Berlin due to a markedly cheaper cost of living. The primary evidence? Aldi’s Dessertcreme & Sahne, a dessert comparable to Milky, the dominant pudding brand in Israel, sold for less than a third of the price. This Facebook post received more than one million likes within four days and created headlines around the globe.

Nearly 75 years after the end of the Second World War, Berlin’s Israeli community is estimated to number in the tens of thousands and impossible to verify due to issues of multiple citizenship. Is Berlin truly this promised land of milk and honey?  Are people from Israel really immigrating here only because of the standard of living, nightlife and Berlin’s fabled cultural reputation? What about those Israelis who leave the country due to the current political climate? And what affects do 20th century history as well as multiple reports of rising antisemitism have on emigration from Israel to Germany?

Three Israeli performers explore these questions using verbatim text from 60 interviews with the widest possible spectrum of partners; Israelis with an active religious background, Israeli Arabs, highly politicized Israelis as well as Israelis who have absolutely no interest in politics.

The ID Festival is funded by the German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, the Szloma-Albam Foundation and KIgA e.V. – Kreuzberger Initiative gegen Antisemitismus

Daniel-Ryan Spaulding

UPDATE: An important note to all guests planning to attend the Daniel-Ryan Spaulding performances on October 11 and 12: we are selling 150 tickets for each performance via our online box office. All guests who purchase tickets from this online contingent are guaranteed seats on chairs and we will sell an additional 20 – 30 seats on cushions on the floor at the door. We heavily encourage all guests to secure their tickets now.

Because you demanded it: Daniel-ryan spaulding returns to ETB | IPAC for his last performances with us this year after a series of sold-out shows!

two nights only!

Daniel-Ryan is an internationally touring Croatian-Canadian stand-up comedian who has performed in over 45 countries worldwide and is the star of the recent hit video series about a hipster expat It’s Berlin!

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Expect a solid hour of sharp, hilarious, sassy, brutal stand-up about expat life, Eurotrash, sex, Yugoslavia, culture, nostalgia, the Dutch and, of course, Berlin!

“Daniel shines when engaged in storytelling, timing his humour well in an admirably relaxed fashion, while his mannerisms and confrontational attitude entertain, as he lets his inner frustrations spill out into hilarious and, at time, brutal anecdotes. Daniel’s combination of camp enthusiasm and fearless outspokenness serve to create a very entertaining show.”
– **** Three Weeks (UK)
“Brilliant, hilarious subversion” – Huffington Post
“Intelligent, and above all very funny. His material is tight. His delivery is strong, and his timing is perfect.” **** Scotsgay Magazine

Watch Daniel-Ryan Spaulding’s viral hit (over 2 million views) on YouTube:

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