Although not an outright rejection, I consider the “deferment” letter (pic) attached below to be related to the various other writer-rejection posts which you’ll find here, here and here. You can search “rejection” with the side-bar for others. Here another rant on failing as a playwright in Germany.
Freiestheater is almost comparable to New York “Off” and London “Fringe”. Almost.
As I have said: rejection is good. Seriously. As a prose writer that cannot get published or as a playwright rejected by theatres, I think it very important, no matter what, to absorb all the failure, learn from it, keep going, and, most importantly, stick to your beliefs, don’t change for others, develop your style, blah blah, blah blah… The scary thing is, I will stick with it, and the way it’s gone thus far, I’ll die very unsuccessful. Whoopee.
So much theatre
Did you know that between Berlin and Munich there is no place in the world with so many theatres? Yeah, there’s actually some kind of UNESCO historical recognition of the German theatre landscape – or at one time there was. Whoopee. It was a big mistake for me back in the late eighties to think that I should go to Germany to kick off my playwriting career. It was also terribly naive to think that I didn’t need to go to New York to make it. At the time I thought: why not do something different?
Thank God for intelligent German chicks
The idea back then was if I’m gonna be a playwright I need to learn all about theater. There was no opportunity to do that in the US. At least not where I’m from. Since I had relatives in Germany, the move wasn’t that difficult. Living here with proper credentials, though, was – but that is another post. After I got settled and did a bit of research, I quickly realized that I could also produce my own plays in Germany – hence, jump-start my second career as a theatre producer and/or director. I met a few intelligent German chicks and got them to help me with translations. I got to know some actors and technicians. I found theatres. I financed the projects with the money I was making from working as a research consultant. Bang. I got laid and made theatre.
Annihilation probably isn’t good
As any creative person knows, achieving the slightest success in the arts is accompanied by the struggle of ALL those who are also struggling to be successful with their creativity. In theatre I suspect this is compounded by the fact that there are many instances of creativity. Perhaps in the early stages of becoming a playwright, dealing with the various creative elements is what determines success or failure, especially in a wholly subsidized community as is the case in Germany. In my opinion, and as I’ve stated here, theatre has three main pillars: actors, directors and writers. The subsidized German theatre has basically annihilated the writer as one of those pillars. Oh my, the actors and directors have taken over. I never had a chance.
Subsidized pay-checks = “writing” German
I heeded the advice of “career” theatre people (dramaturgs, directors, etc.) fortunate enough to have pay checks from subsidies, and sought other venues for my work. I eventually produced two relatively successful plays in the early 90s and two more in early 2000. When I went with these “dues” back to state houses I was still rejected. No one was open to new writing, although I could prove that my plays worked, i.e. that they were ready for the stage. I was then told that you have to be a name first if you don’t write in German. What? Seriously? But I live here and speak your language and… They were absolutely right. See here for post about a no-name German writer who gets a premier in a state house.
Why do I stay here? I enjoy being shunned as though I were a leaper, I guess. Plus, I’m getting old. Life is over.
You can’t start at the top if there is no top
From a writer’s point-of-view – yes, even a failed one – German theatre sucks. (Except for the work of the above mentioned Ms. Kettering, of course.) My reason for this generalization is not because Germany has rejected me or because I’m becoming a bitter old man. It’s because German theatre hasn’t produced a world-class play, actor or playwright in probably thirty years. Productions today are wonderful and exuberant, see my post here – but there is nothing new. Instead it swallows more than 1 billion euros in state subsidies. You would think, with that kind of money, there would be some fantastic funky German play known to the world or some fantastic funky German playwright.
Instead I give you a really cool German word
The market for German-language theatre is huge. And it is self-indulgent. It has become nothing more than an Arbeitsbeschaffungsmaßnahme comparable to Germany’s struggle to rebuild autobahns with a day-late-and-euro-short budget. Of course, one could argue that writers like Botho Strauss and Moritz Rinke (German link only) and Ms. Kettering are great German theatre writers. But they are no where near the likes of Pinter, Albee or even Brecht because their work doesn’t transcend German-ness. With that in mind it is hard for me to swallow all this rejection, which btw, has left me to only writing and no more producing. The advice of the privileged subsidy pay-check clan:
Freiestheater
I waddled around Freiestheater for about ten years and learned that ALL German actors, directors, stage hands, lighting technicians, electricians, carpenters, etc., who were not privileged enough to get a “contract” with a state subsidized house, all worked in Freiestheater. It was a smorgasbord of wannabe Liza Minnelli’s, pseudo intellects who made fun of politicians, rejects. The layers of creativity here, it is very creative!, was suffocating. Beyond that, unlike New York “off” and London “Fringe”, there was no proof of bottom-up success with German Freiestheater. It took me those ten years to realize this. And now, I believe they should take the word “theater” out of Freiestheater. Replace it with hobby.
Ich bin (und darf) kein Deutscher (sein)
I am proud of one aspect of all this failure: of the four plays I originally wrote in English and translated to German and then produced in the dead-end Freiestheater scene, none of them received any state funding, even though I lived, worked and paid taxes in Germany. I financed them myself and owe a lot to the participants, actors and theatre managers. Hundreds of people saw my work. And I consider that a privilege! Ironically, state and city theatre budgets were being cut yet all Freiestheater stages that I tried to get into were still receiving subsidies and they all said NO to me. Ouch.
Can I get a break here?
Below is a deferment letter which never resulted in an affirmative response for a funding request from the city of Düsseldorf in 1992. I consider it a fun reminder of having made a big mistake. And I’m not bitter. Seriously.
Prost!
-tgs-
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