NO MOVEMENT

The third edition of THEATER UNTERM HIMMELSZELT took place from June 27 to July 27, 2025. 

The festival organizers, under the artistic direction of Barbara Wachendorff, offered once again a diverse program of drama, music, and theater with objects.

The overarching theme of the 2025 festival was: NO MOVEMENT.

It dealt with the observation that, in the face of diverse threats and horror scenarios, people often feel powerless and lose faith in their own ability to act.

• The festival kicked off with Samuel Beckett’s WAITING FOR GODOT, a hilarious play about human existence. It was performed at the pier in Ladenburg upon the Neckar River. The performances of WAITING FOR GODOT took place on June 26, 27, 28, and 29.
• A courageous plea for gender equality was made in the reading from MY WEEK WITH SARA, based on the novel by Carl Jonas Love Almqvist, on July 19 at Café Huben. The reading was given by actress Heike Trinker.
• In the concert TRUST & RESISTANCE on June 24, cellist Katja Zakotnikdedicated herself to music whose creators were once threatened, censored, or oppressed, as well as composers who suffered under dictatorships—both then and now.
• Jutta Glaser, Claus Boesser-Ferrari, and Karin Klein were the protagonists at the FRAGILE concert evening on July 25. A musical-literary performance combining texts, songs, soundtracks, and improvisations. In addition to jazz music, the focus is on texts by Ingeborg Bachmann—recited, set to music, deconstructed, and reassembled.
• In Alfred Jarry’s farce KÖNIG UBU, a brazen oaf seizes power by summarily murdering the king – a story full of surprises and satirical sharpness. A play with puppets for adults by Materialtheater Stuttgart.
• At the joint PICNIC CONCERT on Sunday morning, July 27, the audience was treated to a free choir concert with the brilliant Hendsemer Krischer, full of rock, pop, and jazz sounds.
• The festival concluded in the evening with the production ALL DAS SCHÖNE, a play by Duncan Macmillan. The main character in the play creates a list of everything that makes life worth living – a declaration of love for life.