Amerika / Der Verschollene

In the organizer's words:

Lost in the modern world

Like no other text by Kafka, "The Missing Man" describes the class relations of a capitalist society.

The 16-year-old Karl Roßmann, who is disowned by his family and sent to America, has to assert himself in ever-changing social constellations. The technocratic order of the entrepreneur uncle in the skyscraper high above New York, the reality of two casual workers on the street, the overworked elevator boys of a hotel, a cramped flat-sharing community in the artistic milieu - they all play the social game of power and powerlessness, of adaptation and rebellion, which plays the best cards into the hands of the haves and takes after the have-nots. However, it is precisely these outcasts and castaways who do not give up on their future, but carry on inventively as artists of life.

Charlotte Sprenger stages subtle, musical, playful ensemble evenings, including at the Thalia Theater in Hamburg. She is now presenting her first major work at the Münchner Kammerspiele, where she already staged the Fassbinder film "Die dritte Generation" in 2022 as an annual production of the Otto Falckenberg School.

"Today's feeling of powerlessness arises from the fact that we are aware of the circumstances and still follow rules that we didn't make and that we often can't understand, let alone approve of. The visionary Kafka told us this 100 years ago in his novel fragment."

- Charlotte Sprenger, director