Johanna Eiworth four times side by side. The increasingly pink and spiky costume turns her into a rose.

Collage: Julian Baumann Photo:

MK:

Die Möglichkeit des Bösen

Close-up on a Secret Pleasure
Based on a short story by Shirley Jackson

 Therese-Giehse-Halle
 World premiere
 Opening night: 23.3.2024
 1 hour 25 minutes
 Strobe effect, loud music, strong sensory stimuli
 Thu-Sat: 15-45€, Sun-Wed: 10-40€, under 30 years each seat category: 10€
 Therese-Giehse-Halle
 World premiere
 Opening night: 23.3.2024
 1 hour 25 minutes
 Strobe effect, loud music, strong sensory stimuli
 Thu-Sat: 15-45€, Sun-Wed: 10-40€, under 30 years each seat category: 10€

Does evil smell of roses? — “But people everywhere were lustful and evil and degraded, and needed to be watched.”

A heavy, seductive scent of roses hangs over the beautiful Pleasant Street. Miss Strangeworth loves her roses: for her, they represent home and this home is Strangeworth House on Pleasant Street. The unremarkable woman is the anchor of her neighbourhood. She has been living here for three generations: everyone knows her and she knows everyone else. Yet nobody suspects that the universally respected Miss Strangeworth is pursuing a clandestine second life. Her secret pleasure will become the doom of the community.

In her precisely choreographed and visually powerful works, director Marie Schleef zooms in on the forgotten, the repressed and the invisible. She translates the oppressive inner state of her characters into emotional images. Schleef discovers Shirley Jackson (1916-1965) for the stage - an American classic and master of the uncanny who is little known in Germany. Jackson, who is considered the ‘queen of gothic fiction’ and whose fiction combined everyday observations with elements of the absurd and uncanny, influenced various authors of subsequent generations, from Sylvia Plath to Stephen King and Carmen Maria Machado. Her posthumously published short story is being performed for the first time in German-speaking countries.

Performance rights: "The Possibility of Evil", 1997 by Laurence Jackson Hyman, J.S. Holly, Sarah Hyman DeWitt, Barry Hyman. All rights reserved. Translation rights: "Die Möglichkeit des Bösen", translated by Martin Ruf, Festa Verlag.
In cooperation with:
  • Stage Lighting Design Christian Schweig
  • Assistent to the Director Marion Hélène Weber
  • Stage design assistance Yue Ying
  • Costume assistance Jacqueline Elaine Koch
  • Stage Manager Stefanie Rendtorff
  • Theater pedagogy Daniela Blümel, Sophia Bernhard, Filo Krause
  • Directing Intern Jakob Seeberger
  • Stage Design Intern Charlotte Grunewald
  • Dramaturgy Intern Leonie Rinze
  • Production management art Angelika Koch
  • Production management technology Adrian Bette
  • Stage Master Thomas Graml
  • Stage Machinery Friederike Rückauf, Sabine Haslinger
  • Lighting Franziska Erbe, Tobias Fisch
  • Sound design Korbinian Wegler, Paolo Mariangeli
  • Video technology Thomas Zengerle, Maurizio Guolo
  • Makeup Sofie Reindl-Grüger, Nicola Richter-Okegwo, Sara Moradipour
  • Costume Arite Pissang, Fabiola Maria Schiavulli
  • Props Manuel Kößler
  • Carpentry Sebastian Nebe, Josef Piechatzek, Hannes Zippert, Stefan Klodt-Bussmann
  • Locksmithery Jürgen Goudenhooft, Friedrich Würzhuber, Andreas Bacher
  • Decoration Tobias Herzog, Maria Hörger, Anja Gebauer, Lisann Öttl
  • Painting hall Evi Eschenbach, Ingrid Weindl
  • Stage sculpture Maximilian Biek, Amelie Unhoch
  • Thanks to Sylvia Janka
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Learn more about Shirley Jackson and her work!

Press reviews

„Johanna Eiworth spielt dieses stumme Spiel mit einer beeindruckenden Präzision, legt ganze Erzählstränge in einen Blick, eine Körperhaltung, eine Geste.“

Süddeutsche Zeitung • 24.3.24

„Die Regisseurin Marie Schleef schafft mit diesem knapp 90-minütigen Abend etwas, das gleichzeitig Reizüberflutung und Stillstand ist, das beinahe alle Sinne triggert.“

Süddeutsche Zeitung • 24.3.24

„Diese ungewöhnlich langsame und leise Form des Spiels, die dem Abend ein eigenes Tempo verleiht, ohne je langweilig zu werden (…)“

Nachtkritik • 24.3.24

„Marie Schleefs Inszenierung saugt die Zuschauer in eine mystische Welt und überzeugt durch das Zusammenspiel von visueller Verfremdung und großartiger schauspielerischer Leistung.“

Bayern 2 / kulturWelt • 25.3.24

„Die Regisseurin Marie Schleef debütierte mit dem Stoff bei den Kammerspielen und schuf aus dem ganz fein gesponnenen Horror eine bilderstarke Performance der radikalen Entschleunigung.“

Abendzeitung • 24.3.24