Brecht celebrates: Premiere of Saint Johanna in Seekirchen!

Brecht celebrates: Premiere of Saint Johanna in Seekirchen!

On November 9, 2025, a special anniversary will be celebrated in Salzburg: 75 years have passed since Bertolt Brecht was granted Austrian citizenship. To mark the occasion, the local theater is putting on a rousing performance of Brecht's play “Saint Joan of the Slaughterhouses”. Director Cassandra Rühmling, who has also made a name for herself as an actress and composer, has prepared the piece for various venues in order to appeal to a broad audience - especially in times when questions of profit maximization and exploitation are current.

The premiere took place on November 7th in the Markussaal, and the incidental music by Robert Kainar will be premiered on this occasion. The costumes, which were created through a collaboration with the costume department of the Salzburg Festival, show the creative signature of Lili Brit Pfeifer and Jan Meier. Christoph Wieschke from the Landestheater also contributes to the artistic design of the evening. The performance rights were kindly granted by Suhrkamp Verlag.

A dramatic work

“Saint Joan of the Slaughterhouses” is about the title character, Johanna Dark, who finds herself in a battle with Pierpont Mauler, the Meat King of Chicago. Mauler is on the verge of selling his company and is faced with the treacherous reality of the meat industry. The story addresses themes such as poverty and exploitation and presents the difficulties of the working class. Johanna realizes that the poverty of the workers is often caused by immoral behavior and the existing competition between Mauler and his great rival Lennox. Brecht describes her as a “virtuous girl” who fails because of the harshness of the world.

Johanna and the “Black Straw Hats”, a parody of the Salvation Army, try in vain to alleviate the misery of the unemployed. After several failed attempts to create healthy conditions for the workers, she must face the brutal reality of her situation. Her moral sermons are exploited by those in power, showing that the changes she seeks must go far beyond idealistic wishes.

Epic theater in focus

With “Saint Joan of the Slaughterhouses” a typical example of Brecht’s epic theater is brought to the stage. This form of theater aims not only to entertain the audience, but also to encourage them to think critically about social conditions. Brecht and his colleague Erwin Piscator coined this form in the 1920s, and the use of alienation effects is one of the most characteristic devices. Planet knowledge describes that the plot is not told continuously, but consists of loose scenes that speak directly to the audience and make them think.

The upcoming performances will take place in different locations: On November 14th in the Jazzit, on November 15th in the Spektrum Maxglan association, on November 21st again in the Markussaal, on November 22nd in the Kulturhaus Emailwerk in Seekirchen and on November 27th and 28th in the Off-Theater Salzburg, both at 7:30 p.m. This versatility of the performance parts shows the director's commitment to addressing a diverse audience and bringing today's explosive topics to the stage.

Brecht had a strained relationship with Salzburg, where he lived in the 1940s. The acceptance to work at the Salzburg Festival in 1949 earned him citizenship, and yet the critical view of social conditions remains in the foreground in this production. Wikipedia emphasizes that the piece embodies a lesson in Marxist crisis analysis and thus once again emphasizes the urgency of social change.