Klaipėda Puppet Theatre: Kissing the Ashes

A play about the fragility of people and memories
, in Lithuanian with German surtitles

The Lithuanian port city of Klaipėda has a painful past, yet it has risen from the ashes time and again. During World War II, it was initially annexed by the German Reich until, in the fall of 1944, most of its residents at the time were evacuated. When the Red Army reached the city, it found only a few people remaining there.

At the invitation of the Klaipėda Puppet Theater, French puppeteer, director, and former artistic director of the “tjp – Théâtre Jeunesse Public Strasbourg,” Renaud Herbin, conceived a play about this dark chapter in the city’s history. Known for his distinctive visual language, in which he blends puppetry, poetry, acting, dance, sound, and visual elements, he and his team explore the question of how history is told when one does not remember everything—or does not want to remember. What happens to the gaps in memory? Which narrator is more real—the actor or the marionette? “Kissing the Ashes” is one of a thousand possible stories about what happens when a city loses its memory.

Wunder.
International Puppet Theater Festival Munich
October 21 through November 1, 2026
wunderpunktfestival.de

Advance ticket sales begin September 19, 2026