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• 2

• THEATER + TALK
• IN ENGLISH
• IDENTITY
• THIRD REICH

• Fr., 17.04.2015, 20:00

Post-performance discussion in English after SCHWARZ GEMACHT

Berlin, 1938. A patriotic Afro-German actor appears in propaganda films. An encounter with an African-American musician and activist leads to hard questions about the treatment of people of color in Germany and in the United States. The piece raises interrogations about identity that can be discussed with the playwright, the director and the cast after the performance.

• 1A story that examines universal questions of self and citizenship primarily through the eyes of a patriotic Afrodeutscher actor.
• 2 Daniel Brunet, Produzierende künstlerischer Leiter, English Theatre Berlin | International Performing Arts Center

What is “identity”? What makes us who we are? Who has the right to define us? Playwright Alexander Thomas, director Daniel Brunet and the cast invite the audience to discuss, after the performance, the multiple questions raised by the show.

About the Venue:

English Theatre Berlin | International Performing Arts Center

English Theatre Berlin | International Performing Arts Center is the German capital’s only producing and presenting organization in the Hauptstadt expressly dedicated to English, the 21st century lingua franca, as the working language. Our year-round programming comprises the Producing Series – Made in Berlin, the Presenting Series, as well as our Performing Series and Pedagogy Series. We are a proud member of Berlin’s freie Szene, the independent performing arts community, and are currently developing platforms to share our work within Germany and abroad. We consciously use theater and performance as living, discursive forms to bring artists and audiences into conversation with each other about our shared city and the greater world we live in.

www.etberlin.de  

About the piece:

SCHWARZ GEMACHT

Set in 1938 Berlin and drawing heavily upon history, the play imagines a story that examines universal questions of self and citizenship primarily through the eyes of a patriotic Afrodeutscher (Afro-German) actor. Proud to serve his country, he appears in propaganda films calling for the return of Germany’s former African colonies. An encounter with an African-American musician and activist leads to hard questions about the treatment of people of color both in Germany and in the United States of America. Schwarz gemacht is the first project to move completely through English Theatre Berlin | International Performing Arts Center’s new work development series, THE LAB, to receive a full production. It was part of the Colorblind? series of staged readings examining racial identity on stage in 2012 and a two-week workshop was held in December 2013.

About the author:

Alexander Thomas

Alexander Thomas  was born and grew up in Albany, New York. He studied acting in New York City at the Stella Adler Studio (among others). His autobiographical solo show Throw Pitchfork ran off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop as well as the Kitchen Theatre Company in Ithaca, New York. He is one of the contributing writers to the American Slavery Project; Unheard Voices, a monologue play that gives voice to some of the 400 unmarked graves of slaves discovered at the African Burial Grounds unearthed in Manhattan, New York in 1991. This project has been performed in venues throughout New York including the Museum of Natural History. Alexander Thomas has an international career as a stage actor. He was a cast member of the award-winning UK production of On the Waterfront by the esteemed director Steven Berkoff which ran in London’s West End as well the Edinburgh Festival, the Nottingham Playhouse and the Hong Kong Arts Festival.