Katzelmacher

They are stuck in the provinces and want to leave. They can neither live with nor without each other. They eye each other up and gossip viciously. Their boredom, their envy and their money troubles feed their prejudices. Until their aggression erupts into violence against Jorgos, who came to Bavaria from Greece as a guest worker. In “Katzelmacher” Fassbinder portrayed the social and cultural conflicts of a suburban neighbourhood in Bavaria at the end of the 1960s.

In his productions, Emre Akal, collaborating with the artist duo Mehmet & Kazim, creates imaginative artificial play worlds which blend analogue and digital techniques to form their own illusion. In “Katzelmacher” he confronts the workings of a desperate and racist society in the late 1960s with its revenants from the present and future. Inspired by Adorno’s studies on the authoritarian character, the production examines a recurring dynamic: people who feel humiliated humiliate others in turn to make themselves feel superior.

In a specially written epilogue, Emre Akal takes a look at the world of Fassbinder’s “Katzelmacher” from another space and another time.

“The fact that the themes of ‘Katzelmacher’ are so timeless shows how important it is to continually revisit them. Each generation faces its own versions of these social conflicts. The question arises: Are we capable of creating something new with the same old tools?”

– Emre Akal, Director