The European theater system represents a diverse array of styles, organizational structures and interests. Within Europe, the German public theater system (Deutsches Stadttheater) in particular distinguishes itself as one of the oldest, largest and most hierarchical cultural systems, with 80,000 artists across the country and the highest proportion of taxpayer funding in the European context for theater operations at approximately 85%. Meaningful collaboration which utilizes the diversity of artistic, cultural and lingual assets to establish new modes of creation, presents a potential opportunity for positive artistic development across European nations – and ideally outside of Europe as well. Along with other national theater systems, the German public theater must examine itself from a critical lens in order to determine both its areas of strength and areas where it could learn from the practices of other countries. To be most thoroughly considered in this reflection is: What is the most sustainable and ethical way to approach the development of contemporary theater?

One of the results of my essay is that cooperation and collaborations are the most meaningful structural and artistic instruments, they are usually more sustainable than the fragile singular theater organization, which suffers from various problems, each of which severely damages the theater's operation. In collaboration, the original themes and problems can be temporarily negated and high-quality artistic productions and new structures can be created from them, thus accomplishing two tasks in one action. Cooperation and collaboration in the arts stabilize the usually fragile organizations. New structural and cultural forms develop in the cooperation of differently structured partners, and thus a broader resilience and openness for the ethical use of resources and each other.

Despite its rich history and ambition as a cultural institution, however, the German public theater is suffering. Symptoms are the decline in audience numbers across regions and a tendency to overproduce in order to win the audience back. This is followed by a general decline in cultural relevance and legitimacy and accompanied by an asymmetry of power within the organizations. Towards repairing these faults and improving the European theater system as a whole, intentional efforts must be made to modernize the German theater system. The majority of German theater organizations are no longer able to survive on their own and without changing their classic mode of production, as can be seen from the symptoms of the crisis shown above. I therefore recommend establishing meaningful cooperation between countries and their cultural systems, as well as between individual theaters / companies, in order to share resources, artists, facilities, productions and audiences. It is about a logic of sharing and a logic of showing the diversity of theater to people in German cities, which have a very different demographic composition than thirty years ago, and about attracting new audiences.

Now, I would like to take a short excursion into the history of theater, which is by no means a detour, in order to return to this starting point later. The reason is obvious: For three centuries, theater systems in European context have developed in different directions. Roughly speaking, in addition to the very dense and personnel intensive German-speaking theater system, we have the Anglo-Saxon theater, which is very much oriented toward the en-suite operation of individual productions rather than a functioning ensemble theater system. In between, at various stages of development, are the French, Italian, and Iberian, the Scandinavian, Benelux, and the Eastern European theater systems, all of which have very few repertory and ensemble theaters, but a large number of visiting and touring theaters on a guest performance base.

No theater system is perfect, however, because the high degree of specialization leads to a multitude of problems and great vulnerability and fragility. Because of the different starting points, the exchange between the theater systems could lead to completely new structural working conditions, from which new relationships to one another and food for thought for the structural and cultural development of one's own system could later develop.

The overall aim is to strengthen the organizational structures as well as the diversity of styles and the programmatic orientations to make theater operations and independent theater companies more resilient considering declining audiences and the political shift in many European countries. This will benefit audiences as well as theatre makers who have to deal with this new kind of artistic diversity. This leads to developments and new impulses that are urgently needed in many European theater systems, as theater makers and academics from a wide range of countries confirmed in interviews[1]. There is another aspect: the collaborative networking of organizations from different theater systems increases their resilience to impending cultural-political changes.

The development of artistic processes takes place in a fragile environment that is strengthened by collaboration and cooperation, by the exchange it promotes, by the learning effects associated with it, and finally by collaborative production processes that make it possible to bypass or strengthen one's own production capacities. Consider that if a company is banned in a country for political reasons, or destroyed for economic reasons, it or parts of it, artists and even productions can be absorbed and maintained in the networks created until the moment when changes and democratic developments occur again in the country of origin. Then the network partners help to establish a strong artistic relaunch.

Think of the sharp shift to the right in Europe and the need for international solidarity for artists working under difficult systemic conditions. Collaboration can help to mitigate political pressures and compensate for related material constraints, such as limited opportunities to present performances, financial losses due to performance bans, etc. These developments also raise the question of how theater systems in Europe and beyond can evolve in the globalized world and reduce their political dependence. Perhaps it is possible to open up new areas of possibility in order to one day realize cultural and artistic utopias.

History of the German Public Theater

The current position of the German public theater can be further understood through its historical origins. In the 18th century, German theater culture made a defining transition from a system of traveling theater companies to a system funded individually by the more than 250 royal courts across the country. Later on, physical theaters were established for localized companies and managed by noblemen acting as theater directors (Intendanten), who were appointed by the royalty of each region. The first national theaters appeared as a result of the influence of intellectuals such as Schlegel, Lessing, Goethe and Schiller, a shift which laid the groundwork for the public theater system as it exists today.

With the 1870 unification of the German empire, the second major pillar of the modern German theater system—private theaters—were established, with many private operations cropping up in cities such as Berlin and Hamburg. Hundred years later, public and private theaters were joined by a third pillar—independent theaters—the emergence of which was largely the result of a progressive national student movement. The movement sought to weaken regressive politics and retaliate against Nazis, who continued to occupy high government and university positions at the time. Independent artists, groups, and companies are technically state-funded but not state-controlled. They have retained their independence and are only marginally accountable to traditional cultural policy institutions (ministries, city cultural departments). They have absolute programmatic and organizational sovereignty, which means that they can establish, change or abolish themselves through their own power and will.

Cooperation Issues Across Systems

While the establishment of public, private and independent theaters has resulted in a wide variety of operations and a rich offering of diverse theater, music and dance productions, it simultaneously poses a significant problem in its individualistic approach. Frankly speaking, the three subsystems of German theater do not work together at all, although they could and would gain many advantages from doing so. But they do not, because ideological reasons prevent this cooperation. Behind this lies a difference in access to financial resources.

Independent theater groups, in particular, despise and resist the work of public theaters, calling them backward and historically opportunistic, not modern enough, because they rightly feel that they do not receive enough financial support. But this artistic judgment is far too general and ideologically colored. It is not true in this form, because public theaters have developed enormously artistically in the last ten to fifteen years. At the same time, the first promising changes are taking place at the organizational level.

The last significant effort made towards the goal of a stronger collaboration between German theater organizations was a 2014-2020 initiative by the Federal Foundation for Culture (BKS) called the “double pass program” (“Doppelpass-Programm”), in which independent theaters were partnered with public theaters to co-create productions; however the venture eventually ended due to a lack of sustainability and the “partners” rejecting a mutual integration of practices.[2]

During this period, there were approximately twenty pairings between independent theater groups and public theaters over a two-year period, each “couple” receiving €200,000 in extra funding for joint artistic projects. The partners were free to develop one or more projects and present them to the public. The aim of the program was also for the partners to get to know each other better and perhaps learn from each other's production methods and tools. Unfortunately, this did not lead to lasting relationships and sustainability, as the financial incentive of the partnerships disappeared after two years.

A discussion about the compatibility of production methods and processes of public and independent theaters is not unjustified, considering that many functions of the public theater system have not been reconsidered for more than hundred years, while the instruments of independent groups have continued to develop in a complete different and de-coupled direction that is nearer to the working conditions of anglo-saxon than German theater productions.

One philosophy which has unfortunately guided public theater operations for a very long time is the GENIUS PRINCIPLE, a practice which assigns all artistic and managerial autonomy to the Intendant, or theater director. During their terms of five or more years, theater directors have complete control over the whole organization, the theater program, aesthetics, activities of personnel and use of resources. Not only does this configuration make the efforts of between 400 to 500 employees per theater effectively invisible to the public, it also often attributes successes to the director only, while failures are passed down the hierarchy of employees.

There are many instances of directorships being extended indefinitely, with terms lasting as long as twenty-five years. One such case currently involves the former director of the Erfurt Theater, who has continually been accused of abuse of power and has yet to be held accountable for economic and managerial misconduct only. It is cases like these that underline the need for a change, a change in which directors serve the interests of the theater, rather than shirking their responsibilities and continuing to perpetuate exploitation.

A Tradition of Overproduction

It was only with the transition from traveling companies to companies working directly at the court of the noblemen at the end of the 18th century, that artistic productivity became a relevant indicator in the German theater for the first time because of a much better access to resources. At that time, companies producing in one place were able to produce more new plays better and faster, and thus produce more new plays in a year, which was associated with general productivity growth.

As a representation of the royalty, theaters for the first time served as a measure of DISTINCTION and a means through which wealth and cultural taste were expressed. The later established national theaters continued this tradition, with the idea that prolific theaters bolstered the concept of a united German nation. Up until the 1960s, theater remained the primary field of German entertainment, with more than 50% of the population attending theaters regularly. In recent years, however, this number has dwindled drastically, with only 9% of the German population regularly visiting the theaters.

In response to thinning audience numbers, theaters have increased the frequency of productions throughout the year, particularly in an attempt to win back the youth, which has the lowest turnout among all groups. Thirty years ago single theaters held an average of twenty new productions per season; today, it is over twenty-five, which in combination with lower staff numbers has regressed both the quality of productions and employee morale. In effect, an increase in production has not only damaged theater standards and promoted exploitative practices, it has also not fulfilled its original purpose, considering that audience numbers have continued to decline and structural and cultural problems have increased.

Prospects for the Future of European Theater

“Hope dies last” is an apt description of how much theaters across Europe still cling to antiquity. In Italy, the cradle of European music theater during the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods, the number of theaters has tragically decreased from around 700 to under 300. In recent decades, France, Spain, Portugal and the UK have experienced a similar phenomenon.

As I mentioned in my introductory remarks, much like the different systems in Germany, the national theater systems around the world have historically distanced themselves from each other due to cultural differences, as in the case of countries with different national languages. But there are many more points of contact and connection than differences. European theater, for example, is based in all countries, with subtle modifications, on the same Greek theater tradition, which was reproduced on the Iberian peninsula in England of the Elizabethan era, in the time of Moliere in France, of Goldoni in Italy, and in the period of the Traveling Theater, the Sturm and Drang and the Weimar Classics in Germany. The common points of contact in theatrical creation should be sought and found together in order to establish a European theater from which to rise from tradition to a new quality of theatrical creation, which, in addition to artistic goals, should above all serve to mutually strengthen and increase resilience. The theater is a great cultural treasure, not only one of the oldest cultural techniques in the world and the place where artistic productions develop, but also an archive where the knowledge of many centuries and thousands of theater artists has congealed and is accessible to all of us today.

By ethical premises I mean a power-critical approach to structures, especially hierarchies, communication, organizational culture, contractual and financial relationships. Relating this approach to aspects of sustainability, collaborations should only be considered relevant and feasible if they obey certain basic rules that focus on the sustainable use of all resources, especially human labor, and the search for new, sustainable production methods.

I would suggest the following measures as a starting point in the process of structural change and reform of the German and the European theater system:

1) Partnerships and Guest Performances

Public theaters would mutually benefit from forming partnerships with “twin towns” and regions in their European neighbor countries. They would serve as a means to build an understanding of each other’s unique cultures and strengths in artistry, production and management. This would also pave the way for co-productions and guest appearances by directors and artists between partnered countries. Dresden, the capital of Saxony in central Germany, is twinned with Coventry, Wroclaw, St. Petersburg, Skopje, Ostrava and Florence, for example. Each of these cities has cultural institutions or academies for music and performing arts with which to collaborate and cooperate. This would serve to exchange knowledge and ideas and strengthen international exchange in artistic practice, beyond national borders.

2) Collaborative Festivals

Festivals are fields where many collaborative efforts are already thriving. Especially over the last two decades, public theatres have seen and used festivals as an opportunity to increase systemic exchange and to reach out to new audiences[3]. New organizational forms of vertical and horizontal cooperation with invited private or independent guest productions, festival productions and independent producers have shown the new organizational possibilities for a “city theater of the future”. Especially public theaters have taken the opportunity to invite external producers and productions to improve their artistic portfolio and their lack of know-how in the production of festivals and specific festival productions and to learn from them.

As the producer of an independent theater in the city of Erfurt (Thuringia) between 2003 and 2008, I also produced a large festival with our independent company every summer in the 2000s, with big Shakespeare summer theater productions and other smaller productions that complemented the festival. Soon after we were mentioned for the very first time by the national media, different public theaters and independent companies offered us to produce together with them. Their intention was fourfold: They wanted

– to learn from us how to handle complex and often site-specific productions

– with limited resources in a way

– that would allow to build a closer relationship with the people of the city, the visitors, the media, and the politicians, and thus

– establish the festival and the independent group for the long term.

The two structures strengthened each other, the festival strengthened the company and vice versa, and gradually the two merged. At the same time, I was invited in addition to my duties at the independent company and festival, by the National Theater Weimar to take on the role of managing director under equally stressful conditions, such as financial shortages, the threat of a merger with a neighboring theater, and personnel cuts. My task was to apply this knowledge to the theater and not only bring the theater safely through the crisis. The objective was to develop and implement structural reforms and, with the help of politicians, to transform the Weimar National Theater within five years in 2008 into a state theater and thus secure it for the long term.

There are a number of examples in which public theaters have managed to successfully incorporate the originally rather independent festival forms and use them for their own purposes. Every June in Berlin, for instance, the Deutsches Theater Berlin hosts the Authors’ Theater Days (ATT), a celebration of new drama written by upcoming authors and directors. Another success has been the FIND Festival hosted by Schaubühne Berlin, which through the work of curators has become a fantastic opportunity for theater professionals to network and refine programming for upcoming seasons.

Something similar, in a slightly modified and much more complex organizational form, takes place at the International Berlin Dance Festival “Tanz im August”, where the organizer works with various stages in the city of Berlin to present a selection of the productions of the international dance companies that are currently in vogue. It is a hybrid form of vertical and horizontal national collaboration, within the framework of which an organizational platform is created on which current dance acts can be shown as part of over 20 international curated collaborations.

Theater festivals refer to regional, national or international as well as horizontal and vertical forms of cooperation. International collaborations obviously refer to forms of cooperation that systematically—and not randomly—cross borders in order to allow for a targeted programmatic expansion of perspectives and a greater artistic diversity. Horizontal collaborations are those that operate on the same organizational level as all other theaters or groups and thus complement each other. When a theater and a provider of technical, communication or advertising services have a business relationship, these are vertical collaborations in which certain stages of a production process—or in other words of a value chain—complement each other. For a better understanding, the theater production process should be broken down into its sub-services: preparation, production, and presentation (the show), its marketing and distribution, including all communication services.

As a medium for the expression of new artistic signatures and styles as well as production formats and organizational forms, these festivals have proven valuable in shaping the ever-changing landscape of a modern European theater, particularly considering the many international reviewers in attendance reporting on influential performances and trends.

3) New Models of Organization and Management

There are some city theaters across Germany and the German speaking neighbor countries which have already begun a transition from the dichotomous Intendanten model to flat hierarchies and collective management (Zurich, Basel, Essen, Aachen, Schauspiel Halle and Wiesbaden starting from 2025). It is a beginning, some job openings at the top level in the theater industry now also call for teams to apply. However, these are still exceptions to the rule; for example, management positions at the state theaters in Berlin, Munich or Hamburg are not opened publicly at all, but are still awarded directly by the responsible Senator for Culture in the Berlin, Hamburg or Munich Senate without any consultation with the artists and employees of the respective theaters.

Some efforts have been stunted by prevailing ideas, such as an attempt at team management by artists at the Theaterhaus Jena by the Wunderbaum Companie. Cooperative efforts such as at the Dramatic Theatre in Erfurt are fairly new, where thousand people bought their city theater with equal rights. These efforts are admirable in their roundtable approach collectively hosting employees, stakeholders and spectators, this model has to prove if it will be sustainable. Due to the strongly competitive nature of the theater world, in which projects are coveted and production seasons are planned years in advance, a sense of urgency and conflict is often stirred up, leading to less opportunities for collaborative spontaneity. Cooperative organizational approaches, while no firm conclusions can be drawn as they have yet to be empirically tested, show promise in the realm of progressive managerial processes.

In my model of an ethical theatre, I focus very strongly on two aspects: The theater sees itself as a constantly learning and changing organization in which new participation methods are incorporated into operational and strategic decision-making. The latter in particular also guarantees a change and transformation of the theater organization, which in the future will give up all structural limitations and merge much more closely with urban societies. Theater has to give up its old vanities in order to open itself up to the respective local and regional peculiarities. Ethical theatre is based on a number of standards, above all limitation of power, ethical management and an ethical functioning of the theater processes in which no one is disadvantaged. The special thing, however, is that no two theaters are the same because different peculiarities are reflected at each location and incorporated into the model.

4) New Models of Curatorial Leadership

There should also be an “overhaul” of the type of theatre directors who mostly work and direct on the stage. In my opinion, theatre directors must above all develop a profile between leadership, creative management and curatorial expertise. As servant leaders, they should withdraw more and more from their own artistic productions and take responsibility for ethical curatorial practice.

The conclusion from this should be that the practice and tasks of managing, programming and artistically “leading a theatre from the stage”, which has so far been the preserve of one person, the so-called Intendant (Artistic Director/CEO), will be distributed among a whole group of decent leaders who link the various forms of management through their several practices. These various practices include:

– Artistic-curatorial practices in each of the individual theater genres (drama, opera, dance, concert) represented by their department curators,

– “servant” leadership practices that ensure a fair and objective distribution of resources and fair personnel management; Curatorial practices could also be applied here,

– technical leaders who take care of the areas of stage, light, sound, video, architecture, maintenance, security,

– artistic practitioners for the workshops,

– education-oriented curatorial practices to open up new communities, take up their interests and link them with those of the theater, to name just a few examples.

The same should happen in the field of artistic direction and curation. The 1990s and 2000s were a stronghold of lone actors. However, work in theaters and festivals has changed for the better, thanks to new critical discourses. It now follows an image of a clever division of power and labor, which I have called for and defined in my articles and books several times for the theater sector.[4]

The first stages of transformation are now beginning to affect the position of theater directors. But that is not enough. Teamwork should take place at all organizational levels, and artistic organizations should be seen as haptic units in which internal consultation takes place from bottom to top, and vice versa, as well as at the same level from team to team. There is no longer a need for lone directors, but rather for teams, a composition of specialists who do their work according to their expertise, and permanent, more generalist consultants who are brought together as a mutually beneficial unit at every important level of work. This redefines responsibility, multiplies knowledge and experience, and reduces power. If we apply this to the concept of curation, it would mean that in the future, specialist curators would work together with generalist curators (as consultants) at the decision-making level, so that highly qualified decisions, programs, projects and change processes would be initiated. The profession of the external consultant has thus become obsolete, making way for a new model and exciting new job profiles, but above all for a change in existing structures and power potentials.

5) Participatory Production Models

A potential step towards resolving unnecessary competition within the industry is introducing a participatory production model[5], in which all members of a theater cooperative or production team are granted the same participation and voting rights as the artistic director. Along with establishing a flat hierarchy, this would effectively separate all artistic decisions from administrative decisions, which would then diminish the probability of adverse effects on the creative process by managerial operations. It would also free up artistic teams to autonomously pursue new collaborations and projects, such as the company PRINZIP GONZO has achieved in their progressive four-person theater troupe. Their working principle is collaborative: four directors and scenographers work alternately in small groups or together in groups of four in projects that have a new, very immersive and audience-sensitive character. The audience is involved in their productions, for example in game formats such as their GAME OF LIFE and no longer sit still and spellbound on their chairs, but become active theater makers themselves.

6) Establishment of a Regional Funds and Rotating Stagione Systems

A core attribute of the modern theater is thinking beyond geographical boundaries to consider how theater communities can help and improve upon each other’s operations. One approach to this would be to establish a regional production distribution platform, which would function as a collective fund. This model could assess resource distribution from the basis of need, match “sister” theaters, and reward those theaters working closely across borders with “extra funds”.

Today, theaters produce in the expensive “repertoire system”, i.e. a stage is rebuilt every day so that the audience can see a new play every day. From a sustainability and economic perspective, this is a much too expensive method, because it not only overstretches resources and people, it also leads to a chronic system of overproduction. Overproduction means: Theaters are producing more and more to compensate for the demographically motivated decline in audiences.

If theaters could produce in the future in the “stagione system”, however, these plays would be performed four to eight days in a row without rebuilding them every day and could then travel. Or at least the expensive stage sets could travel to other theaters so that the production costs can be shared. Here, sustainability would be strengthened above all through collaboration.

We could call this a “rotating stagione system”, which could inhibit theaters across borders to jointly and multilingually produce the same show in a performance ring two to three times per monthly cycle. If this system was also overseen by a cross-regional fund, there could be further potential to disrupt established power dynamics and democratize curational input.
 

7) New (or Alternative) European and International Theater Networks and Meetings    

The founding of European theater conferences with the explicit goal of collaboration would be a profound step towards overcoming old patterns and forming new relationships between European nations. Conferences could also be held on an international level, with the intention that even more integration of cultures, languages and artistic systems occur. Ideally over the next decades, these connections paired with modernization efforts would begin to take the form of initiatives such as international theater systems and schools, established for artists and professionals worldwide.

The new associations would go far beyond the existing organizations ITI and IETM[6], which are already making initial approaches to international theater work. However, a new system would not stop at a mutual invitation and showing of international productions, but would focus on strengthening artists, artistic work and production networks, promoting the exchange of expertise and personnel, technology and stage sets across existing borders, and ultimately producing jointly and allowing the joint works to travel between countries and regions. In doing so, we are also returning to a certain extent to the "traveling theater" that was still unfinished in the 18th century, which collapsed when these companies suddenly settled at the royal courts, where they were lured by more financial resources.

8) Ethical Teaching Practices

Another field which could benefit from reformed leadership is theater in academics, an area in which many mid- to late-career stage theater professionals assume professorships. Unfortunately, these positions are sometimes taken by individuals who exhibit abusive power and ideological inflexibility, often to the detriment of students who would be best served with an open-minded view of the craft offering many different perspectives, styles and operational models. As someone who has worked in the public, independent and academic realms of the theater field myself, I have witnessed firsthand the role that an overtly biased approach to professorship can play in pressuring the superiority of one dramatic canon or another, before a student has enough knowledge of theater culture to make an informed choice of their own. Particularly in the case of empowering the next generation of theater professionals, effective and ethical teaching practices must be carefully considered.

My ideas and proposals are just a first impulse on thinking of the future of theater; there are many more options to consider. I strongly suggest combining these proposals with my ideas of the Ethical Theater approach that consists of overcoming the structural problems and the asymmetry of power in theaters, as I explained in point 3). Only if all theater stakeholders work together on an equal base with equal rights and decisions to make, the Ethical Theater will be a success. This approach will be the best requirement for more cooperation, collaboration and teamwork between the European theaters in order to form a European theater of the future.

Thomas Schmidt is an author and theater scientist, Professor of Theater and Music Management at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Frankfurt. He has authored over ten books on theater, crisis, reform, and ethics.