Volksbühne-im-Prater would not work past their contracted eight-hour shift since they had labored nearly thirteen hours straight two nights prior at the show's premiere. Vinge pleaded with the venue's staff, who turned on the theater's...
moreVolksbühne-im-Prater would not work past their contracted eight-hour shift since they had labored nearly thirteen hours straight two nights prior at the show's premiere. Vinge pleaded with the venue's staff, who turned on the theater's houselights and powered down the soundboard. Undeterred, Vinge invited the remaining audience members (about a third of the initial one hundred and fifty) backstage where, somehow, they would continue the show. To do so, we climbed onto the decimated stage littered with the remnants of the performance so far: cake, real and fake feces, urine, shaved pubic hair, wheelbarrows of fresh soil, wet paint, a decapitated mannequin, hundreds of hand made props, and various pork products, all of which were generously coated with fake blood. Before we could get backstage, the theater's fire marshal, citing safety regulations, blocked the entrance. In appreciation for those who wanted the performance to continue, Vinge, Müller, and their cast delivered the audience cases of champagne, which we drank, tapping out rhythms on the empty bottles as an actor dressed as the play's typically unstaged villain, the lawyer Hinkle, gyrated slowly for an increasingly drunk and appreciative few. We could stay as long as we wished, but the performance could not continue. Vinge and Müller's uncompromising desire to keep working ran one of Germany's most prestigious experimental theaters aground.
