Workers' and student theater

Workers' and student theater was a politically shaped form of amateur theater in the German Democratic Republic (GDR).

About history

Historically, they emerged on the one hand from the student theaters that have long existed at universities, and on the other from the proletarian lay theaters initiated by the SED cultural functionaries, the “ workers and peasants ' theaters ”. These were “a form of organization of socialist amateur theater promoted and directed by the trade unions , which has its ideological and material basis in the socialist companies and combines. […] The first workers' theaters in the GDR emerged at the end of the 1950s from amateur play groups, dramatic circles and agit-prop groups. ”(Quote: commissioned art) In 1970 there were around 300 amateur play groups in companies, cooperatives and at training centers, financed the respective cultural fund.

In the GDR, theater was seen as an instrument for raising awareness and was part of " agitation and propaganda ". The “ didactic ” and “ dialectical ” theater, which dominated the GDR from the late 1950s, was able to assert itself most strongly in amateur art. There were workers' and student theaters at some GDR universities. Due to the sources, the following presentation is limited to the description of the facilities in Berlin .

Berlin institutions

Berlin Workers' Theater (bat)

The Berliner Arbeiter-Theater (bat) was founded in 1961 by Wolf Biermann and Brigitte Soubeyran . The bat was in the middle of Prenzlauer Berg , between Kollwitzplatz and the water tower , between Schönhauser and Prenzlauer Allee . The building was built between 1887 and 1889 as a dance hall and was later converted into a backyard cinema. The first productions of the young theater, Berliner Brautgang and George Dandin , met with great approval from the audience, but aroused the displeasure of the cultural bureaucracy. Berliner Brautgang , which deals with the building of the Berlin Wall , was banned and the theater had to close in 1963.

The name stayed. The State Drama School in Berlin showed a few performances there, then in 1974 the building became the headquarters of the directing institute founded at the time, which was integrated into the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Art in 1981 . To this day, the directing department works at bat and student productions are shown.

AST

"AST" was the name of the student theater at Berlin's Humboldt University . The abbreviation meant something like " A rbeiter and S tudent T heater". The group was built up and led in 1975 by Wolfgang Bordel together with others. He himself was the “worker” on the stage, having completed an apprenticeship before studying. However, at times there were also “real” workers as members of AST. However, the naming corresponded to what, in "anticipatory obedience", would presumably not result in any intervention by state (GDR) authorities. Bordel, who did his doctorate in Berlin on the subject of "Philosophical questions in the natural sciences", had already directed the student theater in Rostock . In 1983 he became director of the " Theater Anklam ", where he appeared on the party commission as an opponent of Frank Castorf .

For example, the physicist Bernd Lukasch , today director of the Otto Lilienthal Museum in Anklam , the Germanist Manuela Runge , today a book author in Berlin, and the advertising economics student Christa Prüfer, who later became an actor and assistant director of Castorf at the Anklam, played as students at the "AST ". who has been working as an actress under the name Christa Rockstroh since she left the GDR in 1987 . In the ten years of its existence, AST's workforce comprised around 50 people.

Theater at the "House of Young Talents"

Apparently there was another “workers and student theater” at the “House of Young Talents”. The baroque building on Klosterstrasse , which was destroyed in the war, was built in 1951 for the “III. World Festival of Young People and Students “poorly restored. The magistrate then decided to expand it into a “House of Youth”, which would also house the state board of the Free German Youth . In 1954, the building was completed as the "Central Youth Club". In 1959 the clubhouse was combined with the “Culture and Sports Club” to form the “Central Club of Youth and Sportsmen Berlin” and was given its final name a little later. A fire in 1966 destroyed the hall and the wooden roof structure above it. In 1970 the house was reopened. The house was also the venue for the festival of political song and was considered an important home of GDR jazz . After the fall of the Wall there was the “ Podewil ”.

Workers' theater "Maxim Gorki" (theater in the cinema)

Founded in 1960 as an amateur ensemble in Berlin-Friedrichshain by the actress, lecturer and director Hella Len (artistic director until 1997). After reunification, restructuring and continued existence as a non-profit association (initially as “Amateur Theater Maxim Gorki-tik” eV, later as “Theater im Kino” eV). In addition to the venue in Boxhagener Strasse ("TiK Süd"), there is now a second venue in Samariterkiez ("TiK Nord", Rigaer Strasse).

Further

Poetic Theater (Leipzig)

The Poetic Theater has been an amateur theater at the University of Leipzig since 1949 , at that time the Karl Marx University (KMU) Leipzig. The theater was known under various names such as the student stage, the FDJ student stage of the SME, the Beyerhaus studio stage or the poetic theater "Louis Fürnberg". It was a purely amateur theater, but it was also open to participants who were not members of the university. It played an important role in the theater scene in the GDR and also organized meetings of the student stages.

Sources (selection)

Art commission: 1949–90. An exhibition by the German Historical Museum 1995 (Glossary)
SBZ from AZ. 8th edition. Bonn 1963
Hanns Werner Schwarze: GDR today. Cologne / Berlin 1970
Mimosa Künzel (Red.): 25 years of the “Maxim Gorki” workers' theater 1960–1985 . Berlin 1985.
Retrospectives - Insights - Outlooks: 40 years of theater in the cinema . Berlin 2000.