RACHEL AND ME

Performance by Lulu Obermayer and Rachel Troy

In German and English with surtitles.
Duration: approx. 75 min

Rachel and I is a performance about a twenty-year transatlantic friendship, memory, and the aftermath of the Holocaust for the so-called third generation.

The theater maker Lulu Obermayer and therapist and performer Rachel Troy met in 2005 at the Professional Performing Arts School in New York, where they studied acting and developed a close friendship. Obermayer grew up in Munich and has German ancestry, while Troy's Romanian-Hungarian-Jewish grandparents, Holocaust survivors, immigrated to the USA in 1947.

In their first artistic collaboration, Rachel Troy and Lulu Obermayer combine Lee Strasberg's Method Acting, therapeutic techniques, board games, and storytelling to engage with the aftermath of historical trauma and intergenerational narratives. The performance explores the in-between spaces of consciousness, time, and language that shape the understanding of history and personal and cultural identity. Through rituals and symbolic elements, Troy and Obermayer stage their relationship and reflect on the possibilities and limitations of empathy and memory, as well as the lingering effects of history. They use theater as a vibrant practice of memory culture – a space where personal and political dimensions intersect, allowing for an intense engagement with the past and the present.

Concept and Artistic Direction: Lulu Obermayer
Text and Performance: Lulu Obermayer, Rachel Troy
Lighting Design and Technical Direction: Michele Piazzi
Sound and Video Editing: Oliver Harlan
Cinematography: Borys Dubiański, Andi Szelyes
Subtitles and Translation: Caro Seidl and Emily Pollak (Panthea)
Dramaturgical Friendship: Helena Eckert, Gábor Thury

A production by Lulu Obermayer with HochX Theater and Live Art München e.V. in co-production with Sophiensæle and Theater Rampe. With kind support from the Cultural Department of the City of Munich