Debt and Guilt
Leitmotif of the 2012/2013 season

The current crisis in Europe shows that both individual and collective debts have implications far beyond the financial sector. It seems as if accross the continent the so-called debt crisis is used as a pretext for dismantling not only the public sector but also democratic principles.
With neoliberal ideology and the expansion of markets dominating political thought and reality during the past decades, Western democracies are now entering a new area characterized by a new kind of debt bondage regime for the majority of people. According to Italian theorist Maurizzio Lazzarato, this new regime is characterized by a „universal creditor“, in regard to which every single individual becomes not only indebted but also guilty. That is, the obligation to pay instalments turns into debt bondage for an unlimited time and becomes therefore similar to guilt as a moral term without any chance to escape. This conjunction of debt and guilt is one of the reasons why the debt issue infiltrates all aspects of modern life and why the prevailing neoliberal capitalist regime has finally gained the status of a „civil religion“. The current crisis hence appears as a new kind of capitalist governance in which debt is a means of both political power and social control. As a result, not only the social and political order are subject to capitalist interests but also the exploitation of natural, social and cultural resources is accelerated.

In the season of 2012/2013, GARAGE X will explore the connection between debt and guilt in a series of productions and related panel discussions. Yet, not every production shall be associated only with the topic.

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NEW 2012/2013 PREMIERES

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Opening event 19 and 20 October

1. HANDS UP – EXCITEMENT!
Actor August Diehl and Band presenting their new album „lindern“

2. JULIUS DEUTSCHBAUER:
Seeking the most apolitical theatre production in Vienna
As rankings and contests seem to be amazingly en vogue, we shall not stand behind. Therefore, artist Julius Deutschbauer looks back on Viennas recent theatre season and asks for most the boring productions regarding political or social awareness. As part of the opening weekend the will be awarded during a glamorous gala dinner presented by Julius himself.

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THE SACRIFICE
DAS OPFER
by Andrej Tarkovsky
translated to german by Alexander Nitzberg

A 2005YU55 production, presented in co-production with GARAGE X
Director: Philipp Hauß
Austria premiere 31 October 2012

The events around the nuclear accident in Fukushima reminded director Philipp Hauß not only of apocalytic movies but also of the work of Russian filmmaker Andrej Tarkovsky. Based on Tarkovskys picture „The Sarifice“ he deals with the effects of great disasters in cultural and societal terms.

With Katharina Behrens, Markus Heinicke, Thomas Reisinger, Moritz Vierboom

Philipp Hauß
studied acting at the Max Reinhardt-School in Vienna and works as an actor at Burgtheater Wien with directors such as Stephan Kimmig, Luc Bondy, Peter Zadek, Nicolas Stemann, Andrea Breth, David Marton, Roland Schimmelpfennig, Alvis Hermanis and Matthias Hartmann. At Garage X, he already directed „ÜBERLEBEN EINES HANDLUNGSREISENDEN - EINE BERATUNG“ after the play DEATH OF A SALESMAN.

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JÜRGEN KUTTNER EXPLAINS THE WHOLE WORLD
JÜRGEN KUTTNER ERKLÄRT DIE WELT
A cutting-edge video lecture with Jürgen Kuttner

starting 17 November 2012

Jürgens video lectures became famous at the Volksbühne in Berlin as an amazing guide through the all-confusing jungle of modern TV programmes. In Vienna, he presents his popular show for the fourth season.

Jürgen Kuttner
works as a presenter, writer, performer and director at big theatres accross Germany, more often than not in association with director Tom Kühnel

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THE MAP AND THE TERRITORY
KARTE UND GEBIET
after Michel Houellebecq

A Garage X production presented in co-production with ARGEkultur Salzburg

Austria premiere 21 November 2012
Pre-showings at ARGEkultur Salzburg, 15-17 November 2012

translated to german by Uli Wittmann adapted for the theatre by Ali M. Abdullah and Hannah Lioba Egenolf based on the novel LA CARTE ET LE TERROTOIRE by Michel Houellebecq

Director: Ali M. Abdullah
Stage design: Renato Uz

THE MAP AND THE TERRITOTY is the latest novel of controversial French writer Michel Houellebecq. It tells the story of the life and art of fictional French artist Jed Martin who becomes famous by photographing maps and painting scenes about professional activities. Yet his extraordinarily success and hence wealth always appears as a strange and sometimes hostile world. Houellebecq is an award-winning French author, filmmaker and poet. „The Map and the territory“ received the famous french Prix Goncourt in 2010.

With Dennis Cubic, Aylin Esener, Horst Heiß, Alexander Simon

Ali M. Abdullah
works as a director at theatres such as Schauspiel Bonn, Bayerisches Staatsschauspiel München and Schauspiel Frankfurt among others. From 2004 to 2008 he was together with Harald Posch the artistic director of DRAMA X, in 2009 they succeeded as artistic directors of GARAGE X.

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PONIES. A FORCED INDUCTION
PONYS. EINE AUFLADUNG
by Anna Gschnitzer

A bureau production, presented in co-production with GARAGE X and Theater Rampe Stuttgart

World Premiere 5 December 2012

Director: Marie Bues

„Ponies“ is a real-world farce about trial and error regarding self-discovery between coercive creativity and revitalised neocon values. It’s about all or nothing, about lifestyles and work, about critisicm and cynism, about panicking and advertising – and, of course, about ponies. It is an urban survival kit, a social study between soap opera and pony farm. At the end of the day, the ponies shout: Get us the job, even for less!

With Katharina Behrens, Ursula Reiter, Monika Wiedemer

Marie Bues
works as a director across Austria, Switzerland and Germany and will succeed the current artistic direction at Theater Rampe in Stuttgart from the 2013/2014-season.

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WE LOVE AFRICA AND AFRICA LOVES US
by Markus Öhrn / Nya Rampen/ Institutet

A co-production of Nya Rampen, Institutet, Ballhaus Ost, Baltic Circle Theatre Festival (Helsinki), GARAGE X (Wien), Inkonst (Malmö) and Südpol Luzern (CH)

World Premiere 4 October 2012, Berlin
Vienna-Premiere: 13 December 2012

Director: Markus Öhrn

“Daddy” is caught in a crisis. The family has managed to escape the horrors of Joseph Fritzl’s cellar, now daily routine dominates life. The division of social roles has been weakened by middle-class, westernized ways of life: daddy still might be head of the family, the provider and protector of women and children, but he has been ‘castrated’ by society’s lack of recognition for his role as patriarch and feels restricted in the implementation of the family project. We love Africa and Africa loves us takes up where Conte d’Amour left off. While Conte d’Amour described the story of a vertical “stepping down” in the cellar of romantic love, in this new production by Markus Öhrn, the family has managed to make it to the ground floor. From here – a kind of ground zero of modern democracy – its members try to find external justification for their internal psychology. Western images of Africa as an unknown, wild, authentic place in need of aid conveniently lend it the ‘otherness’ the white family needs to redefine and inspire its conventions.

With Elmer Bäck, Anders Carlsson, Jakob Öhrman, Rasmus Slätis

Made possible with the generous support of Hauptstadtkulturfonds Berlin, Swedish Arts Council, Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland, Nordic Culture Point, Swedish Author’s Found, Kulturabteilung der Stadt Wien (MA 07) and Kultur Skane

Markus Öhrn
is a Swedish visual artist. Born in 1972, he graduated with a Masters in Fine Art from the Konstfack in Stockholm in 2008. Markus mainly creates video installations and his work has been exhibited both in Sweden and internationally. Conte d’Amour was the first theatre production Markus has directed. He lives and works in Niskanpää, a small village in northern Sweden, and in Berlin, Germany.

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YOU ARE NOT ALONE
DU BIST NICHT ALLEIN
A self-questioning.

A production of The Practical Mystery, presented in co-production with GARAGE X

World Premiere in January 2013

A schizophrenic comedy with ideas from Alexander Braunshör / Alexander Martos / Mara Mattuschka

Director: Mara Mattuschka

We are living at the end of a century of therapy. However, at the beginning of the 21st century, our „selves“ are more than ever engaged with self-management, self-regulation – and with self-therapy. But can our flexible selves actually act within real-world crises? Alexander is looking out for his true self, gets tired to death – and yet finds nothing. YOU ARE NOT ALONE is an absurd piece of a monologue that questions the self-improvement-dogma of our time.

With Alexander Braunshör

Mara Mattuschka
is an austrian filmmaker, performance artist, actress and singer. Her work was awarded in Berlin, Oberhausen and Vienna among others.

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HEAD-ON
GEGEN DIE WAND
after the movie „Gegen die Wand“ by Fatih Akin

Premiere in January 2013

Director: Alexander Simon

HEAD-ON tells the tragical story of Turkish Germans Cahit and Sibel while embedding it into a broader discussion on identity, ethnicity and migration in modern Germany. HEAD-ON was awarded with numerous film prizes and furthered the discussion on migration and resulting issues in Germany. Fatih Akin was born in Hamburg to Turkish parents and is one of the most important filmmakers in contemporary Germany.

Alexander Simon
works as an actor and director. He is a member of Thalia Theater Hamburg and already worked in Wien with Ali M. Abdullahs productions MY LIFE AS A TERRORIST and currently THE MAP AND THE TERRITORY. HEAD-ON is his first work as a director in Vienna.

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A POLECAT
EIN ILTIS
by Josephine Ehlert

Austria Premiere

A reschen.see-production presented in co-production with GARAGE X

Director: Julia Burger

In the era of worldwide interconnectedness, information is not only available anywhere and at any time, it has seemingly lost its function as a transmission belt between the real world and the virtual fields. „A polecat“ is a piece about a suburban family that dissolves their connection to reality in the worldwide virtual network grid. However, reality is about to strike back.

Julia Burger
studied theatre and media studies in Vienna and worked as an assistant director at Burgtheater, Wiener Festwochen, Drama X and most recently at Schauspielhaus Zürich, where she presented her first works as director.

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SHEET LIGHTNING AT THE TIP OF THE TOE
WETTERLEUCHTEN AUF DER ZUNGENSPITZE
A surreal travesty by Josef Winkler

World Premiere / Commissional work

A Label Minus 1-production presented in co-production with GARAGE X

Director: Gerhard Fresacher

The current work of Carinthia-based writer Josef Winkler is working on reinventing surrealism as a contemporary expression of theatre by combining his own works with indivdual scenes from Federico Fellinis fantasy drama „Satyricon“ from 1969. This project is part of a trilogy on surrealism that Josef Winkler works on especially for director Gerhard Fresacher and GARAGE X.

Gerhard Fresacher
works as a director and stage designer. He already showed numerous productions at GARAGE X.

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Call me God
by Gian Maria Cervo, Marius von Mayenburg, Albert Ostermaier and Rafael Spregelburd

A production of Bayerisches Staatsschauspiel presented in co-production with Teatro di Roma (Teatro Argentina), Romaeuropa Festival, Festival "Quartieri dell'arte" Viterbo and GARAGE X

World Premiere

Vienna-Premiere Spring 2013

Director: Marius von Mayenburg

In October 2002, seemingly indiscriminate sniper attacks in Washington D.C. and Virginia shocked people across the world. The so called „Beltway sniper“ killed ten people, and until today his motivation remained unclear. Presumptions reached from islamist terror to marital disputes. Against this background, four playwrights from four countries deal with the crisis of identity that western democracies are facing. Gian Maria Cervo from Italy, Rafael Spregelburg from Argentinia and Albert Ostermaier and Marius von Mayenburg from Germany will trace our relationship to different cultures and the dichotomy of freedom and security and will ask from where a certain degree of self-hatred in modern societies derives. The common work aims not at balancing various artistic styles but tries to show different perspectives on a complex issue.

Marius von Mayenburg
is a playwright, dramaturg and director. His plays are being translated in more than 30 languages.

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THE IDIOT’S STONE
Der Stein der Idioten
A festival of pataphysics by and with Fritz Ostermayer

Presented in collaboration with schule für dichtung and donaufestival Krems

World-Premiere in April 2013

Pataphysics is a philosophy or pseudophilosophy dedicated to studying what lies beyond the realm of metaphysics. The term was coined and the concept created by French writer Alfred Jarry (1873–1907), who defined 'pataphysics as "the science of imaginary solutions, which symbolically attributes the properties of objects, described by their virtuality, to their lineaments."
cited from Wikipedia

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THRILLER! Jason and Medea just before midnight
A radicalization of an ancient greek myth by Izy Kusche

A production by Izy Kusche / Antje Schupp presented in co-production with GARAGE X

World Premiere

Director: Antje Schupp

Myths were warmly welcomed and hotly critized, myths have themselves produced myths and are still subject to broad discussions. The project THRILLER undertakes the daring attempt to clarify these confusions - by producing new mystifications. Izy Kusche was awarded as a writer by the Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Culture for this work.

Antje Schupp
studied cultural studies and theatre and media studies in Vienna and Munich and works as a director at Theater Basel, pathostransporttheater Munich and GARAGE X among others.

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A PROJECT WITH Schorsch Kamerun

World Premiere in May 2013

Details tba

Schorsch Kamerun
is a musician, singer, author, director and founding member of political punk band „Die Goldenen Zitronen“. In recent years, he has also worked as an author and director for the theatre and has staged several of his plays at renowned theatres around Germany, Austria and Switzerland. In 2010 he already showed his project DER LETZTE VERGEBLICHE VERSUCH DER POPKULTUR at GARAGE X.

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TBA

Premiere in May 2013
Director: Dieter Haspel
Details werden im Laufe der Spielzeit bekannt gegeben.

Dieter Haspel
was a founding member of the "Café Theater" in 1968 and since 1981 the artistic director of the former Ensembletheater am Petersplatz, the forerunner of GARAGE X.

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A COLLABORATION BETWEEN GARAGE X AND Wiener Festwochen

Premiere in May / June 2013
Details to be announced during the press conference of Wiener Festwochen in December 2012.

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YOUNG TALENTS EPISODE 4
3 playwrights / 3 directors / 3 world premieres in a single night

Premiere in June 2013

As in previous years, we will stage 3 short pieces in a single night, showing young talents in writing and directing from across Austria, Switzerland and Germany.

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JEUNESSE X

Ab Oktober 2012

As in previous years, GARAGE X will host a series of music events in collaboration with Jeunesse Austria.

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DEBATE

PANELS IN 2012/13

1. CLAIMS AND DEBTS
Robert Misik in talk with Stefan and Ralph Heidenreich
Public debts are seemingly a valid justification for the dismantling of social security systems and basic democratic principles across Europe. Yet, loan and interest rates and hence debts are an immanent part of capitalist economy and therefore part of the political order in Western cultures. Stefan and Ralph Heidenreich examine both meanings and history of the term in their new book and will present their work fort he first time in Vienna.

2. THE COMING DEMOCRACY
Robert Misik in talk with theorists
Not only with the ongoing supremacy of economy over politics, the model of Western liberal democracies is under pressure. Discussions about „post-democracy“ and „post-politics“ indicate a subtle undermining of the political sphere – while at the same time, many people claim „real democracy“ and new approaches are tried and tested. This discussion panel will examine old concepts and new approaches of democratic social and economic order for the societies to come.

3. NATURE NURTURE CULTURE
Talk with theorists

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RE-STAGINGs

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MY LIFE AS A TERRORIST After a film by Alexander Oey

A GARAGE X-production at Thalia Theater Hamburg / Gaußstraße
Director: Ali M. Abdullah

With Alexander Simon und Tom Buhrow

WHAT HAPPENED AFTER NORA LEFT HER HUSBAND; OR PILLARS OF SOCIETY
WAS GESCHAH NACHDEM NORA IHREN MANN VERLASSEN HATTE; ODER STÜTZEN DER GESELLSCHAFTEN
by Elfriede Jelinek

A GARAGE X-production
Re-staging: 23.10.2012
Director: Ali M. Abdullah

With Dennis Cubic, Anita Gramser, Markus Heinicke, Julia Jelinek and musicians Verena Dürr & Ulla Rauter

SKIRT DAY
VERRÜCKTES BLUT
by Nurkan Erpulat & Jens Hillje


After the movie „La Journée de la Jupe“
 by Jean-Paul Lilienfeld
 A new space company-production presented in co-production with GARAGE X
Austria Premiere
Re-staging: 25.10.2012
Director: Volker Schmidt

With Alireza Bayram/Paul Brusa, Patrick Bongola, Oktay Günes, Karin Yoko Jochum, Nancy Mensah-Offei, Mustafa Kara, Benjamin Muth, Sandra Selimovic

PREY
BEUTE
A black farce by Joe Orton

A Theater Oberhausen production
Re-staging in January 2013
Director: Herbert Fritsch

With Susanne Burkhard, Brigitte Cuvelier, Torsten Bauer, Marek Jera, Caspar Kaeser, Jürgen Korkesch, Peter Waros und Klaus Zwick

THE DISTANT SOUND
DER FERNE KLANG
Novel by Gert Jonke, adapted for the theatre

A GARAGE X-production
World Premiere
Re-staging: 14.11.2012
Director: Susanne Lietzow

With Peter Badstübner, Martina Spitzer, Thomas Stolzeti, Martin Zrost

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