Director Christopher Rüping's stunning productions of Das neue Leben, Einfach das Ende der Welt and Miranda July's Der erste fiese Typ in Bochum have told of our longings, our fears, our attachments and our loneliness as tenderly as they have been funny as they have been clever, in any case with an open heart. In a short conversation, Christopher Rüping talks about the search for material, interesting rehearsals, and lost suitcases.
Your last works were based on very different texts, an opera combined with a text by Joan Didion, a piece by Sarah Kane, a book by Dante ... How do you find a material or does the material find you?
On the one hand, there are certain themes that interest me and the artists I work with. Together we look for material that we can use to deal with these themes. For example, we came across Einfach das Ende der Welt: We were interested in the question of whether it is possible (or even necessary) to escape one's own history in order to become oneself. But it also works the other way round: someone tells me about a material and through this way, I encounter materials that challenge me in different ways. That is what happened with Miranda July's Der erste fiese Typ, for example. In these traps the material leads to the subject, in others the subject leads to the material.
The best moment of a rehearsal – how can it be found?
For me, the best moments at rehearsals always happen just before you move from the rehearsal stage to the actual stage. At that point, the rehearsal stage, where a bunch of strangers had gathered around a table a few weeks ago, has become, in the best case, an intimate, protected, free space. At the same time, everything on the rehearsal stage is only hinted at, so you're not really doing everything "yet" – and that's where a special kind of freedom often lies.
What have you ever lost that you don't want to find again?
I had an old, heavy, noisy wheeled suitcase that I hated. It was stolen from me. I am very grateful for that.
- A new production
- Director: Christopher Rüping
- Place: Schauspielhaus
- First performance/Premiere: 09.03.2024
- Director: Christopher Rüping
- Director: Christopher Rüping