Soufflage at the Staatstheater, by Jim Culleton
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What was the Irish‑German collaboration that sparked the director’s immersion in German theatre?
I recently experienced an intense immersion in another culture when I got the chance to direct a play in a German state theatre. The play, Refuge, by Deirdre Kinhan, is a co production between Fish Amble in Ireland and Statstheater Mainz in Germany. It explores the story of German refugees who fled persecution in the early seventeen hundreds and ended up living in Rathkeel, County Limerick. As the cast is a mixture of Irish and German performers, and the German actors are part of a repertory system, performing plays in the evening as they rehearse others during the day, we rehearsed in Mainz, a beautiful city near Frankfurt, with a population of about a quarter of a million. Working in a German state theatre was an extraordinary experience and an opportunity to work differently to how we do in Ireland.
The most striking difference is in the level of government funding that our German colleagues receive.
How does government funding for the Staatstheater Mainz compare to arts funding in Ireland?
We were told that the Statstheater Mainz is a mid scale state theatre, so their funding is just thirty eight million euro per year. Despite recent improvements in funding for the arts in Ireland, this allocation to one theatre is still more than a quarter of Ireland's entire annual arts council budget to cover every art form throughout the country. In Germany they don't use the terms upstage or downstage, denoting the back or front of the stage.
Why do German and Irish stage directions (upstage, stage left/right) differ and how did it affect rehearsals?
Stage right and stage left are also used differently. In preparation for the production I met the German set designer online and there was some confusion over this. But then we discovered that in Ireland, stage right and stage left is from the actors' point of view, not the directors or the audiences. In Germany it's the other way around.
What is a ‘soufflage’ in a German theatre rehearsal and why did it become a key tool?
But of course, I was told, since your perspective as director is the most important one of all,
I
thought to myself, I think I'm going to like this place. In France, the sides of the stage are not referred to as right and left either, but jardin and court, after the sides of the stage which led to the garden and courtyard of the Tuileries Palace in Paris. That probably wins as the most romantic version. A few months before rehearsals began, the chief dramaturg emailed me to ask would I like a soufflage in rehearsals? I had no idea what this meant, so I looked it up and discovered it might be linked to the word souffle. I thought, well it would be lovely to have a baked egg dish in rehearsals, but I doubt that's what they mean. I also found a suggestion that it might be connected to the French word souffleur, a glass blower.
Again I thought for how lovely is that, but hardly much use to us in rehearsals. I responded saying I would love to have a soufflage in rehearsals. It sounds gorgeous, but please let me know what it is.
Why do locals say the Staatstheater is the heart of Mainz and how does that reflect the role of culture in national identity?
It turns out it's a prompter, blowing the lines to the actors, I suppose, and was a wonderful addition to rehearsals. We exchanged many new phrases and sayings, like explaining that in Ireland when we say come here to me or go away, we don't actually intend the listener to come closer or go further from us. Also at home, the director meeting the actors after a run through to give feedback is called giving notes. In Germany the rector gives a critique and then rehearses the corrections, which has a slight implication that things have gone wrong, which they may well have, but is not necessarily the case. They quite liked our word notes, suggesting a helpful and productive meeting. I had great hopes when I went to Germany that I would learn the language, become so fluent that I would merge seamlessly into the community, and no one would know I wasn't German.
After a few weeks there I was attending a play in the theatre, and I couldn't work out where my seat was, so I said, Excuse me, please, in German, Enschuldgung bitte, to an usher, who responded, Oh, are you with the Irish Theatre Company? So I didn't manage to blend in quite as much as I had hoped, but I did experience a different way of doing things which was fascinating. The Irish performers and myself noticed that the State Theatre is right in the middle of the city, on the main square.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What was the Irish‑German collaboration that sparked the director’s immersion in German theatre?
0:00–0:54
2
How does government funding for the Staatstheater Mainz compare to arts funding in Ireland?
0:54–1:21
3
Why do German and Irish stage directions (upstage, stage left/right) differ and how did it affect rehearsals?
1:21–1:40
4
What is a ‘soufflage’ in a German theatre rehearsal and why did it become a key tool?
1:40–2:40
5
Why do locals say the Staatstheater is the heart of Mainz and how does that reflect the role of culture in national identity?
2:40–4:30