Christiane Rösinger
DIE GROSSE KLASSENREVUE
“Good evening, everybody, we are going to bring you the best possible entertainment!” A promise the KLASSENREVUE will not break. Sketches, dancing and a whole load of songs: scrupulously deploying every type of performance and tons of humour, this show drags the present class structure out from obscurity behind its ideological veil. With indie icon Christiane Rösinger, Stefanie Sargnagel, Paula Irmschler and many others.
Language: German with English subtitles
Acoustic amplification through induction loop for visitors with hearing aids
30.5., 17:00: introduction in German for blind and visually impaired visitors
Tickets for all Impulse events are also available from our ticket shop.
But who is actually allowed to join in here? After a playful privilege competition, six experts are left: people from the working class who have been consistently plagued by money worries to this day. The middle class children who are left are allowed to be in the band providing musical accompaniment. The thematic framework is established in the very first song: “Rich-shaming, inheritance-shaming, redistribution, resistance” the ensemble belts out cheerfully from on stage. Get stuck in!
The fairy tale of social advancement through achievement is presented here as mini-drama shrouded in mist, in which all sorts of powerful devices are used to prevent the working classes from climbing the social ladder. A supposed therapist for inheritance shame describes how those who criticise capitalism yet benefit from legacies can combat their shame. The revue finds many forms for its complex theme. And in rhymes and songs the ensemble repeatedly describes a rich life with little money. Social climbing? No thank you! Because redistribution is the only way. Because otherwise the rich can do without their clever talk about classicism.
“A raised fist, filled with fervour – and steadfast defiance: they would rather drink cheap sekt and face poverty in old age than sup the leftover champagne of the ruling class.” Patrick Wildermann, Tagesspiegel
Credits ›
Concept, Text and Composition: Christiane Rösinger
Director: Meike Schmitz, Christiane Rösinger
Co-Composition: Paul Pötsch
Musical Director: Laura Landergott, Paul Pötsch
Band: Laura Landergott, Paul Pötsch, Albertine Sarges
Performance: Sila Davulcu, Doreen Kutzke, Paula Irmschler, Julie Miess, Minh Duc Pham, Christiane Rösinger, Stefanie Sargnagel, Andreas Schwarz
Stage: Marlene Lockemann, Sina Manthey
Costume: Svenja Gassen
Mask: Thomas Korn & Juli Schulz
Video and Live Camera: Kathrin Krottenthaler
Choreography: Rúben Nsue
Lighting Design: Hans Leser
Associate Director: Stella Nikisch
Associate Stage Designer: Rosina Zeus
Associate Costume Designer: Katharina Achterkamp, Aleix Ilusa
Associate Dramaturg and Producer: Lisa Homburger
Assistant Choreographer: Sara Fernández
Translation: Lyz Pfister and Andrew Clarke (Panthea)
Sound: Rozenn Lièvre, Torsten Schwarzbach (HAU Hebbel am Ufer)
Video: Julia Cremers (HAU Hebbel am Ufer)
Artistic Advisor: Aenne Quiñones (HAU)
Technical Director: Amina Nouns (HAU)
Production Manager: Chiara Galesi (HAU)
Produktion ›
A production by Christiane Rösinger / HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin. Funded by the Capital Cultural Fund.
Biographies ›
Sila Davulcu, born in Istanbul in 1982. Classic third generation. Davulcu’s grandmother came to Berlin from Turkey as a “guest worker” at the end of the 60s and gradually brought her children after her. Davulcu grew up in Kreuzberg (36), where she still lives today. As a child, she loved acting and singing. But she never dared try to make this her main profession and instead she did all the regular things: primary school, graduation, training, jobs.
Paula Irmschler was born in Dresden in 1989 and now lives in Cologne. She has already written columns for Intro, Neues Deutschland and Musikexpress. From 2019 to 2023 she was an editor with the satirical magazine Titanic. Her novel ‘Superbusen’ was published in 2020, it will be followed in 2024 by ‘Frau und Mutter’.
Doreen Kutzke, born in the dark forests of the Harz mountains and raised in the GDR, is a multidisciplinary musician, actor and composer from Berlin. She has been involved in musical projects since she was a child and now performs under the name Kutzkelina. Kutzke founded the Kreuzberg School of Yodelling and teaches yodelling and extended voice techniques around the world. She has worked as a voice tutor at Art Academy Reykjavík, Goldsmiths University London and the University of the Arts Berlin. She has co-operated in numerous combinations with artists including Hermann Nitsch, Column One, Element of Crime, Parabelles, Fearless Bob, Malcolm Alison, Myriam Van Imschoot, Raionbashi and the LA Free Music Society.
Laura Landergott, the Austrian multi-instrumentalist, is famous for the versatility of her musical work. In 2019 she toured with queer icon Peaches, performing at venues including the Royal Festival Hall in London, Kampnagel in Hamburg and the Berlin Volksbühne. She currently plays with the group Ja, Panik and Fuffifufzich. In addition to her live stage presence, Landergott also works as a musical director for a range of theatre productions. For many years she has collaborated with the theatre collective Copy & Waste, which has won the prestigious George Tabori Prize.
Julie Miess was conceived in Manchester, but was born in Karlsruhe in 1972. Descended from Transylvanian peasants and a family that owned a fur factory, she had a materially privileged upbringing. In 1991 she moved to Berlin. Alongside her life as a musician, she also conducts post-doctoral academic research into books and monsters. From the mid-90s she played bass in the band Britta with Christiane Rösinger, later founding the band Half Girl, where she sang and played keyboards. In 2021 Rösinger changed Miess’s life once again by recruiting her to the theatre band for ‘Planet Egalia’ and casting her in the role of cheeky little Fandango. Since 2022 Miess has also performed in a musical duo, combining her love of Lemmy, cats and noise: Motörcat.
Minh Duc Pham, born in Schlema, Germany, in 1991, is an artist and lives in Berlin. Pham completed his diploma in Exhibition Design and Scenography at HfG Karlsruhe in 2019 and studied Performance and Design Theory as a guest at the University of the Arts Berlin. In his works in the visual and performing arts, Pham examines the theme of identity amid the tensions of gender, race and class.
Paul Pötsch, born in Lauchhammer/Brandenburg in 1988, is a freelance musician and composer. He lives with his family in Hamburg. He trained as a musician with Laurenz Wannenmacher (piano) and Eckhard Lipske (acoustic and electric guitar). He is a founder member of the bands Trümmer, Hotel Rimini and Ilgen-Nur. For his band projects he has been awarded the German Record Critics’ Award, was nominated for an ECHO Prize and won the HANS Hamburg Music Prize as Young Artist of the Year. He continually releases new sounds and regularly performs national and international concert tours – amongst others, on behalf of the Goethe Institut. He has presented his own musical theatre performances at HKW Berlin (the rock opera ‘Vincent’) and Kampnagel im Hamburg (the GDR musical revue ‘Wir treiben die Liebe auf die Weide’).
The musician and writer Christiane Rösinger moved to Berlin in 1985, where she founded the bands Lassie Singers and Britta. The themes of her books and songs include criticism of couples and capitalism, the challenges to Bohemian life created by a precarious existence, and practical feminism. The city of Berlin is the setting for her novels, provides material for her columns and has inspired song lyrics and theatre texts. As well as making music and years of working as a journalist, one of Rösinger’s priorities has always been to create local structures to promote young musicians and counter the male-dominated music business. In the 90s she roganised the legendary “Flittchenbar” in the Maria at the Ostbahnhof and, following a long break, revived it again in the Südblock at Kottbusser Tor. Her artistic and personal connections in the city made the housing crisis a particularly pressing issue for her, expressing itself in the song ‘Eigentumswohnung’ about housing and class on her 2017 album ‘Lieder ohne Leiden’. Rösinger created her first work as a director in 2019 in response to an invitation from the HAU Hebbel am Ufer. The stage musical ‘Stadt unter Einfluss – das Musical zur Wohnungsfrage’ was produced by HAU as part of the festival Berlin bleibt! Stadt, Kunst, Zukunft. It was acclaimed by the public and the media as “popular theatre in the best sense.“ Following on from this successful collaboration, Rösinger devised her second musical stage production at HAU ‘Planet Egalia – Ein feministisches Singspiel’ in 2021 and ‘Die große Klassenrevue’ in 2023.
Albertine Sarges, born in Berlin Kreuzberg in 1987, studied Musicology in Leipzig and is a freelance musician working in theatre and pop music production.
Stefanie Sargnagel, born in 1986, studied Painting in the class run by Daniel Richter at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, but spent more time at her bread-and-butter job in a call centre. She has been a freelance writer since 2016 – and has spent more time with her financial adviser ever since. She won the BKS Bank audience prize at the competition for the 2016 Ingeborg Bachmann Prize. Her two books ‘Statusmeldungen’ and ‘Dicht’ have both been bestsellers. Her latest book ‘Iowa’ was published in December 2023 by Rowohlt.
Andreas Schwarz aka Herr Schwarz (aka “Krah-Krah”) is one of the leading movers in the Berlin underground, electronic, punk, art and party scene. Originally from the Black Forest, the artist, singer and performer is the promoter of the festival Ich bin ein Berliner(in) at SO36, mixes at “Chantal’s House of Shame” and attracts attention with his avantgarde scene and festival appearances.