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in: Locations, Building, Cultural Venue

Volksbühne

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"If you mean it really well with the Volksbühne (as the critics almost always assure you), for God's sake just leave it a few years of quiet, undisturbed work!" Volksbühne Berlin, issue 6, July / August 1931, p. 12 </ref>

The Volksbühne is a theater building on the Platz. It was built in 1914 for the Freie Volksbühne e.V. based on designs by Oskar Kaufmann.


History[]

Making Of[]

See also: Construction of the Volksbühne

Piscator: Too much revolution for the Volksbühne?[]

Because the show "Who's the boss here?" turned out to be a bestseller (and those responsible couldn't get enough of it themselves), a spin-off was created in 1927 for director Erwin Piscator. From 1924 on he had been senior director at the theater. Initially, the Volksbühne was doing well economically in these years and with 160,000 people the Volksbühne association had more members than ever before, so the association's board was also very satisfied with Piscator. Its staging, which was always technically ultra-modern, also corresponded to the claim to initiate social changes and to shape Berlin's urban culture.

But when the number of members declined due to rising inflation, the productions by KPD member Piscator made the association's board increasingly afraid. The board found his staging of Ehm Welk's Thunderstorm over Gottland too revolutionary for the cross-party claim of the house. The board accused Piscator of having reinterpreted the piece for his own interpretation in an inadmissible manner. As always, this discussion about the role of art was not limited to the Volksbühne, but also made waves beyond that. Piscator didn't feel like this show anymore: He left the Volksbühne and founded his own theater, the Piscator-Bühne, in 1927.

Deprecation and new edition[]

In the aftermath of the November 20, 1943 war, the place was attacked by aerial bombs, and the supposed stronghold proved to be not that resistant at all and suffered a lot. For technical reasons (but probably not only) the Volksbühnen show was canceled in January 1944 until further notice. On April 26th, 1945 there was another huge rumble and by now nobody should have dared to go into the house (or anywhere else). By then, broadcasting had long since ceased.

When both the broadcasting station and all stars were no longer available, a new edition of the Volksbühne was sought from 1947 with a new broadcasting company (logo color: red). The Volksbühne movement formed what felt like 50 times in 50 years and joined the general mood in the new, anti-fascist counter-draft to the old tinsel from before: The summer hit in the winter of 1947 (and long afterwards) was called `` Youth awake! by the FDJ-Chor KaWe (really not a One Hit Wonder !). [1]

On April 21, 1954, the house was reopened or reopened. There was no real agreement. In 1974 the 20th birthday was celebrated in any case, in 2014 the 100th was celebrated again - can someone not count on that ?!

The reopening was accompanied by a slight but significant re-branding: From now on, the slogan Die Kunst dem Volke was missing from the portal. Why? Well because that was clear to everyone anyway!


Who's the boss here?[]

The show is a spin-off, which usually takes place outside the theater and square and decides who has to say that in the house for the coming years. The popular casting show has been held since 1913. Their terminology is different and the number of episodes and their mode have varied greatly over the years. The winner receives the title of Volksbühnen boss. So far, the following people have won the show:

  1. ↑ A very nice version on Aunt Tube
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