Müller & Müller (world premiere)
Scenes of a writer's marriage in a spectacular setting from texts by Heiner and Inge Müller – SOLD OUT!
Tickets & dates
About the production
Start
7 p.m.
End
9 p.m.
Heiner Müller was one of the most famous writers of the GDR. His influential work was and is revered far beyond its borders. Inge Müller, who wrote important poetry, has largely been forgotten as a writer today. The two had been married since 1955 and spent a short but intense creative period in Lusatia at the end of the 1950s.
On the occasion of the repair of a damaged overburden conveyor bridge in the Klettwitz open-cast mine not far from Senftenberg, they both researched and wrote the radio play »Klettwitzer Bericht«, which was published in 1958 and premiered as a play at the Senftenberg theatre in the same year. Other so-called production plays, i.e. dramas set in socialist industrial production, were developed, written and awarded prizes together. Heiner and Inge Müller are regarded as co-inventors of this new and unique drama of the young GDR. At the same time, both wrote numerous poems that were closely related to each other and expressed their concerns, attitudes and feelings for each other eloquently and very personally.
At the original location of »Klettwitzer Bericht«, two young actors, now around the same age as the Müllers at the time, immerse themselves with the audience in the love and working relationship of Inge and Heiner Müller and bring their partnership to life against the backdrop of the construction of a socialist society at the time and the industrial culture of Lusatia. They develop a site-specific and immersive station theatre that confronts the poetic intimacy of the poet's fragile love with the overwhelming rawness of the open-cast mining landscape. The theatre evening combines texts by the couple, brings them to life in dialogue and thus unfolds the drama of a passionate and eventful relationship that ended with Inge Müller's suicide on 1 June 1966. »Müller & Müller« focusses in particular on the utopian project of an artistic and partnership-based symbiosis, in which the social utopia of solidarity and togetherness was also to be suspended, and traces the success and failure of this enormous experiment.
The year 2025 marks the 100th birthday of the (re)discovered author Inge Müller, the 30th anniversary of the death of the former star writer Heiner Müller and the 70th wedding anniversary of the two poets. In the play »Müller & Müller«, the ghosts of the writing couple now encounter the gigantic successor to the overburden conveyor bridge they once covered in the former Klettwitz open-cast mine: the F60. And it, too, is lying idle - inaugurated in 1991, it stopped working after just one year of service as part of the structural change in the region and was eventually turned into an open-air museum. And yet the revenants find no peace...
»Müller & Müller« combines a live radio play with a scenic homage and a chamber theatre relationship drama with a night tour on the F60. An extraordinary Lusatian original against a magnificent backdrop.
imersiwny źiwadłowy wjacor wó basnikaŕskem póriku w łužyskej industrijowej krajinje
Immersive theatre evening about a pair of poets in the industrial landscape of Lusatia
Cooperation between Lausitz Festival and neue Bühne Senftenberg
In co-operation with the Förderverein Besucherbergwerk F60 e.V. and F60 Concept GmbH
By bus & train to the event
Why don't you leave your car at home and come to the event by public transport? Click on the button to calculate your route.
We owe this service for the Lausitz Festival to the transport associations VVO, VBB and ZVON.
Visitor bus shuttle:
Outward journey: 6 p.m. – From Senftenberg
From: Neue Bühne Senftenberg, Theaterpassage 1, 01968 Senftenberg / Zły Komorow
To: F60 Visitor Mine, Bergheider Straße 4, 03238 Lichterfeld-Schaksdorf
Return journey: 9:30 p.m.
From: F60 Visitor Mine, Bergheider Straße 4, 03238 Lichterfeld-Schaksdorf
To: Neue Bühne Senftenberg, Theaterpassage 1, 01968 Senftenberg / Zły Komorow
*The cost of 5 euros for the return journey will be charged on the bus.
Nele Trebs
Nele Trebs was born in Berlin in 1999 and grew up in Brandenburg. She has been in front of the camera for film and television since the age of six.
She has appeared in numerous projects, including the award-winning post-war drama »Lore« by Cate Shortland and the internationally renowned Netflix series »Dark« by Baran Bo Odar and Jantje Friese. From 2020, she studied at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts in Berlin, from which she graduated in April 2025. During her studies, she appeared on stage in several theatre productions, including for the Berliner Ensemble and the Berliner Philharmonie.
Nico Dorigatti
Nico Dorigatti was born in Lower Austria in 2001. He studied acting at the Max Reinhardt Seminar at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna.
After completing his studies, he began a master's degree in physical theatre at the Accademia Dimitri in Ticino. Parallel to his studies, Nico Dorigatti has worked internationally as an actor, director and author. He has worked on theatre projects in Austria, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, China and Turkey. He has performed in theatre, dance and opera productions at the Burgtheater Vienna, the Theater in der Josefstadt, the Theater Freiburg, the Vereinigte Bühnen Bozen, the wortwiege Festival, the Schlossspiele Kobersdorf and many others. In Lower Austria, he has been writing, directing and developing independent, cross-genre theatre productions since 2017, such as »Septemberfeuer«, »Nikolaos« and »Featherman trifft die Gespenster«.
Michael Höppner
Michael Höppner is Head Dramaturge Stage at the Lausitz Festival. He is involved in the programme design and coordinates and accompanies all theatrical festival productions.
He also works as a production dramaturge on selected productions and has staged a number of festival events. His passion is the facilitation and realisation of performing arts that leave the beaten track, create extraordinary social situations and in which people can enjoy life to the full.
Until the end of the 2023/24 season, Michael Höppner was head dramaturge of the music theatre, deputy opera director and director at the Deutsches Nationaltheater Weimar under the opera direction of Andrea Moses. He was co-founder and co-director of the festival »Passion :SPIEL -Weimar Weekends for Contemporary Music Theatre« at the DNT Weimar. In 2024, the music theatre section of the DNT Weimar was awarded the German Theatre Publishers' Prize. He has close artistic partnerships with opera and theatre director Andrea Moses, composer Brigitta Muntendorf and choreographer and dancer Margaux Marielle-Tréhoüart.
Michael Höppner was born in Berlin, where he graduated from high school, completed his musical training and studied theatre, literature and musicology at the Free University of Berlin. Between 2003 and 2005, he worked as an assistant dramaturge on productions by Frank Castorf, Christoph Marthaler and Martin Wuttke at the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz. From 2007 to 2010, he worked as an assistant director for Christoph Schlingensief, Andrea Breth, Sebastian Hartmann, Jan Bosse, Stephan Kimmig, Roland Schimmelpfennig, Alvis Hermanis and Luc Bondy, among others, at the Burgtheater Wien.
Between 2011 and 2014, Höppner was a master's student of music theatre directing at the Hanns Eisler Academy of Music in Berlin and has been working as a freelance director for contemporary music theatre, opera and drama as well as a dramaturge since 2014. He was co-founder, chief director and one of the artistic directors of the independent music theatre ensemble Opera Lab Berlin. Höppner also taught music theatre dramaturgy at the TU Berlin and the HfM FRANZ LISZT Weimar, has taught directing and dramaturgy several times elsewhere and currently teaches directing at the HfM »Hanns Eisler« in Berlin.
In addition to his work with Opera Lab Berlin, Michael Höppner has directed at the Volksbühne Berlin, Burgtheater Wien, Nordharzer Städtebundtheater, Theater Trier, Schauspiel Leipzig, Deutsche Oper and Staatsoper Berlin, Neuköllner Oper, Bayreuther Festspiele, Hochschule für Musik und Theater Leipzig, Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin and others, as well as at festivals of contemporary music theatre (Munich Biennale for Contemporary Music Theatre, Eclat Festival Stuttgart, Dresdner Kunstfest, Musiktheatertage Wien, Ult. as well as at festivals of contemporary music theatre (Munich Biennale for Contemporary Music Theatre, Eclat Festival Stuttgart, Dresden Art Festival, Music Theatre Days Vienna, Ultima Oslo, SPOR Arhus, Time of Music, November Music and Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival).
Jacqueline Butzinger
Jacqueline Julianna Butzinger is a sound director, performer and creative programmer in the field of electroacoustic and experimental music.
In her work she combines artistic and technical perspectives and realises sound installations and live electronics for contemporary music, theatre and interdisciplinary performances. She is particularly interested in the spatial design of sound, the interplay of acoustic and electronic elements and the development of interactive sound systems. She studied Music Informatics in Karlsruhe and Electroacoustic Composition at the HfM Hanns Eisler in Berlin under Prof Wolfgang Heiniger. Her works have been presented at the ZKM Karlsruhe, the Beethoven-Haus Bonn, the Klangwerkstatt Festival and the Akademie der Künste in Berlin, among others.
Artists
Play Nele Trebs
Play Nico Dorigatti
Version and Staging Michael Höppner
Sound Design Jacqueline Butzinger
Location
Location Visitor Mine F60, Lichterfeld-Schacksdorf
Address Bergheider Straße 4, 03238 Lichterfeld-Schacksdorf
Cooperation partners
