The Munich Kammerspiele is a successful German language theatre in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

. The Schauspielhaus in the Maximilianstrasse is the major stage.

History

The Munich Kammerspiele was founded in 1911 as a private theatre of Erich Ziegel in Schwabing

Schwabing

Schwabing is a borough in the northern part of Munich, the capital of the German state of Bavaria. It is divided into the city borough 4 and the city borough 12...

. Since 1917 Otto Falckenberg

Otto Falckenberg

Otto Falckenberg was a German theatre director, manager and writer. In April 1901, he co-founded Die Elf Scharfrichter, the first political kabarett in Germany....

 served as director and moved the theatre in 1926 into the Schauspielhaus in the Maximilianstrasse which had been constructed by Richard Riemerschmid

Richard Riemerschmid

Richard Riemerschmid was a German architect, painter, designer and city planner from Munich. He was a major figure in Jugendstil, the German form of Art Nouveau, and a founder of architecture in the style...

 and Max Littmann

Max Littmann

Max Littmann was a German architect.Littmann was educated in the Gewerbeakademie Chemnitz and the Technische Hochschule Dresden...

 in Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau

Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art—especially the decorative arts—that were most popular during 1890–1910. The name "Art Nouveau" is French for "new art"...

 style in 1901.
Since 1933 the theatre has been a municipal theatre of the City of Munich. Since 1961 the Werkraumtheater has served as second stage for the Kammerspiele. In 2001 the new large building by Gustav Peichl

Gustav Peichl

Gustav Peichl is an Austrian architect. Gustav built the EFA Radio Satellite Station in Aflenz Austria. And - is Ironimus - caricaturist.-External links:*...

 with a stage for rehearsals next to the Schauspielhaus was opened.

The directors

Since the 1920s the Kammerspiele has been one of the most important German language theatres, presenting numerous world premieres of works, including those by Friedrich Dürrenmatt

Friedrich Dürrenmatt

Friedrich Dürrenmatt was a Swiss author and dramatist. He was a proponent of epic theatre whose plays reflected the recent experiences of World War II. The politically active author's work included avant-garde dramas, philosophically deep crime novels, and often macabre satire...

, Frank Wedekind

Frank Wedekind

Benjamin Franklin Wedekind , usually known as Frank Wedekind, was a German playwright...

, and Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...

. Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...

, Bruno Hübner, Axel von Ambesser

Axel von Ambesser

Axel Eugen Alexander von Österreich , better known as Axel von Ambesser, was a German actor and film director....

, Fritz Kortner

Fritz Kortner

Fritz Kortner was an Austrian-born stage and film actor and theatre director.Kortner was born in Vienna as Fritz Nathan Kohn. He studied at the Vienna Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. After graduating, he joined Max Reinhardt in Berlin in 1911 and then Leopold Jessner in 1916. Also in that year...

, Peter Stein

Peter Stein

Peter Stein is a critically acclaimed German theatre and opera director who established himself at the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, a company that he brought to the forefront of German theatre....

, Franz Xaver Kroetz

Franz Xaver Kroetz

Franz Xaver Kroetz is a German author, playwright, actor and film director. His plays have been translated and performed internationally.-Life:Kroetz attended an acting school in Munich and the Max-Reinhardt-Seminar in Vienna...

, Robert Wilson

Robert Wilson (director)

Robert Wilson is an American avant-garde stage director and playwright who has been called "[America]'s — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist'". Over the course of his wide-ranging career, he has also worked as a choreographer, performer, painter, sculptor, video...

, George Tabori

George Tabori

George Tabori was a Hungarian writer and theater director.-Life and career:Tabori was born in Budapest as György Tábori, a son of Kornél and Elsa Tábori. His father died in Auschwitz in 1944, but his mother and his brother Paul managed to escape the Nazis. His son Peter Tabori and again his son...

, Erwin Faber

Erwin Faber

Erwin Faber was a leading actor in Munich and later throughout Germany, beginning after World War I, and through the late-1970's, when he was still performing at the Residenz Theatre...

, Max Schreck

Max Schreck

Friedrich Gustav Max Schreck was a German actor. He is most often remembered today for his lead role in the film Nosferatu .-Early life:Max Schreck was born in Berlin-Friedenau, on 6 September 1879....

 and many others important actors and writers have staged plays there and have been awarded with numerous prices.

The Artistic/Producing Directors of the Kammerspiele

One of the most famous Artistic/Producting Directors (Intendant

Intendant

The title of intendant has been used in several countries through history. Traditionally, it refers to the holder of a public administrative office...

) of the Kammerspiele was Otto Falckenberg

Otto Falckenberg

Otto Falckenberg was a German theatre director, manager and writer. In April 1901, he co-founded Die Elf Scharfrichter, the first political kabarett in Germany....

 (1917-1944), known as the "mavin of Expressionism

Expressionism

Expressionism was a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas...

" in Germany during the Weimar Republic

Weimar Republic

The Weimar Republic is the name given by historians to the parliamentary republic established in 1919 in Germany to replace the imperial form of government...

, was credited with producing and/or directing many important productions at the Kammerspiele, including the first staged play of Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...

, Drums in the Night

Drums in the Night

Drums in the Night is a play by the German modernist playwright Bertolt Brecht. Brecht wrote it between 1918 and 1920, and it received its first theatrical production in 1922. It is in the expressionist style of Ernst Toller and Georg Kaiser...

, in 1922, as well as those of Frank Wedekind

Frank Wedekind

Benjamin Franklin Wedekind , usually known as Frank Wedekind, was a German playwright...

, August Strindberg

August Strindberg

Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...

, and important productions of William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

.

Since the end of World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 and beginning in 1945 Erich Engel

Erich Engel

Erich Engel was a German film and theatre director.- Biography :Engel was born in Hamburg, where later he studied at the School of Applied Arts...

 (1945-1947), Hans Schweikart

Hans Schweikart

Hans Schweikart was a German film director, actor and screenwriter. He directed 28 films between 1938 and 1968. He wrote for the film The Marriage of Mr. Mississippi, which was entered into the 11th Berlin International Film Festival.-Selected filmography:* The Comedians * The Marriage of Mr...

 (1947-1963), August Everding

August Everding

August Everding was a German opera director and administrator. He studied at the Universities of Bonn and Munich, where launching his career in the 1950s...

 (1963-1973), Hans-Reinhard Müller (1973-1983), Dieter Dorn

Dieter Dorn

Dieter Dorn is a German theatre director, also for the opera, the manager of the Münchner Kammerspiele from 1983 to 2001 and now manager of the Bavarian Staatsschauspiel.- Biography :...

 (1983-2001) and Frank Baumbauer

Frank Baumbauer

Frank Baumbauer is an award-winning German theater director and artistic director active in the German theater community. He is the son of German casting agent Erna Baumbauer. Baumbauer was from 2001 - 2009 the director of the Munich Kammerspiele.-External links:...

 (2001-2009) were managers of the Kammerspiele. In 2010 Johan Simons

Johan Simons

Johan Simons is a Dutch theater director.Simons received his education at the Rotterdam Dance Academy and the Maastricht Academy of Dramatic Arts. He also taught directing in Maastricht for a number of years....

was appointed artistic director.

External links

• http://www.muenchner-kammerspiele.de/index2.php?&URL=home.php?