Theatrical spat
August 14, 2009
Claus Peymann, the 72-year-old director of the Berliner Ensemble, and Rolf Hochhuth, an acclaimed playwright and co-owner of the Theater am Schiffbauerdam, in which the company performs, have always had a strained relationship, to say the least.
Hochhuth has called his theater colleague an "obscene creature" and accused him of having an "uncooperative attitude" towards a "78-year-old, not unknown writer."
The pair's most recent highly publicized spat reached a dramatic climax Thursday when a Berlin state judge upheld Peymann's plea to bar Hochhuth from holding rehearsals in the theater for a production of his own play "Sommer 14." It is scheduled to open on Aug. 22.
Hochhuth owns the theater and rents it to the state of Berlin. According to the contract, the dramatist is permitted to use the building during the summer break for projects he organizes and pays for himself. The rest of the year the Berliner Ensemble, which was established by playwright Bertolt Brecht and his wife Helene Weigel in 1949, perform in the theater, as they have since 1954.
Peymann has refused to grant Hochhuth access to the theater on the grounds that renovation work is being carried out there and the facility is currently unusable. In response, hot-blooded Hochhuth reportedly had photos taken of a cleared-off, functional rehearsal stage.
A matter of timing
What the theatrical row comes down to is a clause in the contract that stipulates Hochhuth give one year's notice if he wants to conduct rehearsals at the theater during the summer break.
While he did send such a letter in February 2008, Peymann turned down the request, demanding that Hochhuth select a different director and set a new date for the performance of "Sommer 14."
Hochhuth ignored the cancelation, thereby, according to the court, invalidating his previous application for rehearsal time in "Summer 2009" - which, suitably, has become the play's unofficial title.
Ironically, Peymann had commissioned Hochhuth to write the play in 1988, while he was director of the Burgtheater in Vienna.
No amicable solution
Aug. 9, Hochhuth beseeched the mayor of Berlin, Klaus Wowereit, to take action in his favor - and threatened to terminate the rental agreement with the troupe immediately. Currently, it is set to end in 2012.
"I don't want an amicable solution, I want to dismiss my contractual partner because he has left me in the lurch and isn't even capable of giving me a key to my own building," Hochhuth told journalists after Thursday's court hearing.
"Of course they will be dismissed without notice and that's final," he added.
Not only have Peymann's lawyers argued that this is not legally possibly, it would for all intents and purposes mean the end of the Berliner Ensemble.
kjb/dpa/AP
Editor: Nancy Isenson