Theater im Bahnhof
DUDES halten endlich die Klappe
Finally – a play about old white men! Featuring two examples of the species and two twelve-year-old girls. Only this time the usual order of things has been reversed. The girls say what’s what and the dudes keep their mouths shut.
FFT Düsseldorf
Language: German, very little language
On stage, a couple of men in their mid-fifties in checked shirts do what dudes do: drill holes in things and do stuff that involves beer. Skilfully seasoned with piano music and elegant slapstick. The girls watch, give direction and comment on what is going on.
One thing is clear: the dudes have given up control. Looking for a prototype man of the future, the Theater im Bahnhof has turned to the next generation. What do the girls see when they look at these dudes: two representatives of a group that still clings on unjustly to the levers of power? Two blokes who simply ought to vanish into thin air? Or something else again? Sometimes they have mercy on the dudes, sometimes they don’t.
“A successful parable for the tiresome redundancy of meaningless rituals and patterns of behaviour that are the way they are simply because someone once persuaded themselves that that was how they had to be.”
Lydia Bißmann, kuma.at, 3.12.2022
Credits ›
Direction: Sahar Rahimi
Concept: Ed. Hauswirth, Rupert Lehofer, Sahar Rahimi
Performers: Florentina Piffl, Emilia Thelen, Ed. Hauswirth, Rupert Lehofer
Design: Helene Thümmel
Technical Direction: Moke Rudolf-Klengel
Production Manager: Christina Romirer
Production ›
Funded by the City of Graz, the Regional Government of Styria and the Republic of Austria’s Federal Ministry for Arts, Culture, Civil Service and Sport.
Biographies ›
The Theater im Bahnhof Graz identifies as a contemporary folk theatre. Its theme is Austrian identity, by which it means self-identification, self-image and images of others, consensus and dissent in the reality of current society. These require constant negotiation, which is why the Theater im Bahnhof is continually altering its practices. It is permanently improvising its own existence. The TiB is an alternative institution and runs its own production space and venue in Graz. It operates locally, regionally and internationally. It is also the largest full-time, professional, independent theatre company in Austria. It conducts its work as a collective of highly accented, sought-after individual artists. Feedback within the ensemble plays a role in all its creations. TiB actors are theatre-makers. For over 30 years, the TiB has primarily produced its own productions, which are devised as a collective.
Ed. Hauswirth, born in Styria, is a director, performer and founder member of the Theater im Bahnhof Graz. From 1990–2005 he was Styria’s Regional Adviser for Non-Professional Theatre. Since 2006 he has been Artistic Director of the Theater im Bahnhof. He has directed numerous productions for the Theater im Bahnhof, the Rabtaldirndln, the Volkstheater, Schauspielhaus Graz, Schauspiel Dortmund and the Vorstadttheater Graz. His work has been presented at steirischer herbst, Wiener Festwochen, Theater der Welt and the Impulse Festival, and he has also worked as a guest director at numerous theatres in Austria and Germany. He has won several awards.
Rupert Lehofer, born in Graz, is a founder member, actor, dramaturg and writer with the Theater im Bahnhof, Graz. Since 2003 he has also formed part of the performance group Umherschweifende Produzenten together with Seppo Gründler. He has worked as a performer and content producer with Zinganel/Hieslmaier, Oleg Soulimenko, Zobel & Schneider and others. He is an improviser and previously appeared as a clown with Rote Nasen Österreich. He has also worked on several films.
Florentina Piffl-Percevic (13) lives with her parents, three siblings Philomena (15), Ferdinand (11) and Severin (8), and golden retriever Emil on the outskirts of Graz. Florentina has been in the same class as Emilia Thelen since their first year at primary school and is now in Class Three at Gibs – Graz International Bilingual School. Florentina has experimented on stage for a number of years with the theatre club of the Graz children’s theatre Next Liberty. She has also performed as a child extra in the operas ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ and ‘Morgen und Abend’. She loves athletics (Styrian Under-14 pentathlon champion in 2022 and, with Emilia, Styrian Under-14 80m sprint relay champion), skiing, mountaineering, reading and chilling out in her hammock.
Sahar Rahimi, born in Tehran, is a director, writer and performer, who currently lives in Munich. She studied at the Institute of Applied Theatre Studies in Gießen and is a co-founder of the performance group Monster Truck. She works in the disciplines of theatre, performance, installation and video in both the independent sector and in city theatres. At the heart of her work lies her interest in the ambivalent areas on the boundary between power and powerlessness.
Christina Romirer has worked with the Theater am Bahnhof in a variety of different roles since 2009. She often travels with TiB on tour, e.g. with ‘Black Moonshine’ to Eisenerz and Vordernberg, ‘Friedhof der Eigenheime’ to Murau and ‘My Life in the Bush of Sarajevo’ to Sarajevo and Salzburg. She studied Transmedia Arts at the University of Applied Arts and Stage Design at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz (KUG). Her work and projects move between the fields of theatre and film design, interior design, the design of public spaces and the visual arts.
Moke Rudolf-Klengel was born in Graz, is a co-founder of Radio Helsinki, the independent radio station in Graz, and until 2019 was part of the artists’ collective ekw14,90. Musician. Technician at the Theater im Bahnhof.
Emilia Thelen was born with a talent for appearing in front of people without embarrassment. Her father has written and performed musicals for many years and her mother is a journalist with ORF. When she was at kindergarten, she volunteered to pose in children’s clothes for a fashion house. Her empathy has always been high enough to make group dynamics “explode.” She also enjoys travelling. She has been an active cheerleader for several years, and participated in international competitions. She believes it is important to set herself ambitious targets, at school as well as in athletics competitions. She also enjoyed amateur stage performances at primary school. Emilia can also contribute a few bars on the guitar to a social gathering: an instrument she found quickly at the age of 8: "I’m learning the guitar because I can always have it with me when I’m travelling through Europe, you can’t do that with a piano…" She has joined the theatre group at the International School in Graz and then auditioned for the Theater im Bahnhof and was cast in the play ‘Dudes halten endlich die Klappe’, even though they were looking for an older girl. Emilia has given numerous interviews to Austrian newspapers and public television. Here too, one can sense the ease and seriousness with which she approaches acting.
Helene Thümmel (*1990) studied Architecture (BA) in Graz, Austria, and Media Arts/New Media (MA) at the School of Arts in Nova Gorica, Slovenia. She has worked as a stage and costume designer for theatre and film productions since 2010 and is and has been part of a wide range of artistic co-operations and alliances. As an artist, Helene Thümmel moves between analogue and digital media. Inspired by science, politics and society, she attempts to understand wider connections and examines concepts such as distance, space and borders in social and political contexts. To do this, she employs tools including video, objects, text and photography in her installations. She has participated in numerous group and individual exhibitions in cities including Vienna, Graz, Nova Gorica, Trbovlje, Brussels and Rijeka. In 2020/2021, Thümmel was awarded the City of Graz’s Foreign Travel Scholarship and the Region of Styria’s Kunstraum Steiermark Scholarship.