‘Nachtland’ is a made-up German word. It suggests a place of eternal darkness.

Germany. Today. Nicola and Philipp, with their respective other halves, are clearing out the house of their recently deceased father. When they find an old painting wrapped in brown paper and hidden in the attic, the party can begin. The somewhat mediocre tableau depicts a street scene from Vienna in the 1920s, painted by a certain… A. Hitler. Opinions on what to do with the painting vary widely. In any case, we can say that the end of the problems is not yet in sight. Nachtland is an occasionally cringe-worthy satire in which the (European) heritage and the renewed rise of the far right are examined. As always, the characters offer no solution at all… It all sounds very serious, and it is, but Von Mayenburg’s pen ensures, as in his previous plays, that this seriousness is dressed in a cloak of verbal fireworks and hilarity.

Marius Von Mayenburg (born 21 February 1972 in Munich) is a German playwright and dramaturge. In 1994, Von Mayenburg began his studies at the Hochschule der Künste in Berlin. His first play, Haarmann, premiered in 1996 at Baracke (Deutsches Theater in Berlin). Since 1999, he has been dramaturge and writer-in-residence at the Berlin Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, where he often collaborates with Thomas Ostermeier.

Thomas Ostermeier’s theatre is sometimes called ‘Capitalist Realism’, referring to a movement within German visual arts in the early 1960s. The name of the movement, first used by Gerhard Richter, Sigmar Polke and Konrad Lueg, was a pun on the socialist realism of the Soviet Union and the GDR. The artists, two of whom came from the GDR, wanted to show how capitalism influences daily life and how people’s consumer behavior is influenced by advertising and mass media.

We can safely say that Marius Von Mayenburg’s work can largely thrive under this heading, but that he adds a few more layers. Several characteristics always emerge in his plays: the setting is always ‘Bourgeois Bohemian’, the mirror he holds up to us is always confrontational, the dialogues are musical, rhythmic, prickly and, thanks to the author’s razor-sharp observation, downright hilarious. Furthermore, time and space are played with shamelessly, the transitions are abrupt and unannounced, ‘on’ and ‘off’ run through each other, the characters not only talk to each other but also address the audience directly…

Marius Von Mayenburg wrote Nachtland on commission from the Royal Court Theatre in London. The play will now be performed in Dutch for the first time.