Four Walls and a Roof

"What is home? What is a safe place for artists' thinking spaces and emotional worlds? Are the eponymous four walls and a roof enough? [...] The audience [...] is involved in a comprehensive meditation on the feeling of homelessness." Eberhard Spreng, Theatre of Time, February 2025

In 1947, Bertolt Brecht was summoned before the Committee on ‘Un-American Activities’ (HUAC) in exile in America, which was supposed to combat communist activities. Brecht had written a statement for this hearing, which he was ultimately not allowed to read out. The scrutiny of the German writer, playwright and director and his rhetorical excellence in answering the questions ambiguously in bumpy English are well documented. The Lebanese artist duo Lina Majdalanie and Rabih Mroué, who have been creating inspiring and internationally sought-after theatre evenings for many years by overwriting, varying and modulating contemporary historical documents, take on Bertolt Brecht's memorable interrogation in their new work ‘Four Walls and a Roof’ and link it to their own experiences. Their examination of Brecht's statements to the committee echoes the current political and social issues, the ideological aberrations and the fierce and irreconcilable confrontation of opinions. True to the playful approach that Majadalanie and Mroué have always pursued, the two artists interweave the historical documents with fantasies and digressions and with piano music and live singing of songs by Brecht's companion Hanns Eisler in their critical, painful and humorous interrogation. Lina Majdalanie and Rabih Mroué, who share Brecht's experience of exile, resolutely reject any form of preconceived opinion.

Tickets Four Walls and a Roof | Sa. 21. Juni, 18:00
The screening will be followed by a discussion (in English).

Direction, text, performance: Rabih Mroué, Lina Majdalanie
Dramaturgy: Sandra Noeth
Technical direction: Thomas Köppel

A co-production by Rabih Mroué and Lina Majdalanie with Residenz Schauspiel Leipzig, Festival d'Automne Paris, HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin, Berliner Festspiele, - Performing Exiles, Künstler*innenhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt a. M., Kampnagel, Hamburg.