Die Friedensstifterin

In the organizer's words:

by Avishai Milstein
In cooperation with the Consulate General of the State of Israel and the Beit Lessin Theater Tel Aviv

Alice from Husum, called Ali, is on a guest performance tour in Gaza together with her string ensemble at the invitation of a German cultural institute; her big concert is due to take place the next day. Ali is convinced that art and culture can bring people together and pacify conflicts. But when the Israeli-Palestinian conflict suddenly comes to a head and airstrikes are launched on Gaza, the ensemble flees head over heels to Germany - leaving Ali behind.

Instead of despairing, Ali tries it on her own: she wants to play for peace, for the people. She does everything she can to achieve this: she meets a young Palestinian man, the assistant of a Palestinian cultural institute with a penchant for the philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte, a young Israeli soldier, a nurse who lost her own sister in the war, an honorary Israeli president. And finally she gets caught between the fronts: What is wrong, what is right in this conflict that is inscribed in every biography and in which everyone believes they have the right on their side? And so Ali suddenly finds herself in the middle of the Middle East conflict, which she was so sure could be pacified by her cello playing.

In The Peacemaker,Avishai Milstein, Israeli author, director and dramaturge at the Beit-Lessin Theater in Tel Aviv, poses the question of what power art and culture can have: What happens when a Central European understanding of it meets the reality on the ground? How do we position ourselves in the face of historical, biographical and political lines of conflict?

Josua Rösing studied directing at the Max Reinhardt Seminar in Vienna and was subsequently assistant director at the Deutsches Theater Berlin. He has directed at the Theater Kiel, Theater Regensburg, the Staatsschauspiel Dresden and in Moscow and St. Petersburg.