Dickicht

Chaos in the megapolis of Chicago: Malaysian lumber dealer Shlink enters a lending library and asks to buy the opinion of its clerk, George Garga. This starts a fight without rules, without morals, without motive, in which both opponents put everything on the line. Garga loses his position because of Shlink's provocation, who then forces Garga's girlfriend and sister Marie into prostitution and also manages to put Garga in jail. In so doing, he not only ruins Garga's family financially, but also destroys its cohesion. Garga denounces Shlink for raping his sister and begins a campaign to lynch him. It is a battle of life and death, a fight in the jungle in which people only seem to be close through struggle.

Baumgarten's work is always characterized by the use of different media, a line that connects to the epic theatre of Bertolt Brecht. In Dickicht Baumgarten experiments with the epic form: the whole piece was produced as a film and put on stage in one abstract space. With this formal experiment Baumgarten radicalises Brecht's distancing effect.

»The separation of picture and sound is as virtuoso as it is astonishing. On the one hand, it condenses the conflicts and, on the other, prevents identification with the characters, in the sense of Brecht and his command: »Don't stare that romantically!« The goal of Brecht's alienation effect - that the actors as well as the audience are thinking and not merely empathising – is emphasised by Baumgarten with contemporary means. The ensemble follows him brilliantly, but remains cool in all its passions and euphoric in all its clarity of mind.« (FAZ, Irene Bazinger)

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