Josef Szeiler
Josef Szeiler, Vienna, 14 June 2022
“The starting point was always a counterdraft.”
As a co-founder of the legendary collective Angelus Novus and with his epic productions of ancient dramas as well as Brecht’s “Fatzer” fragment, Beckett’s “Endgame,” and Heiner Müller’s “The Battle” and “Hamletmachine,” Josef Szeiler rose to become one of Austrian theatrical life’s great perennial pushers of the envelope. He also influenced many students in a lasting way as an instructor of Anna Viebrock’s scenography class at the Academy of Fine Arts. At Vienna’s Hohe Warte Stadium, Szeiler tells of his beginnings with the Wiener Komödianten, his journeyman years in the German Democratic Republic, his view of theater as a state of exception, and once-in-a-lifetime rehearsal moments.
“The starting point was always a counterdraft.”
As a co-founder of the legendary collective Angelus Novus and with his epic productions of ancient dramas as well as Brecht’s “Fatzer” fragment, Beckett’s “Endgame,” and Heiner Müller’s “The Battle” and “Hamletmachine,” Josef Szeiler rose to become one of Austrian theatrical life’s great perennial pushers of the envelope. He also influenced many students in a lasting way as an instructor of Anna Viebrock’s scenography class at the Academy of Fine Arts. At Vienna’s Hohe Warte Stadium, Szeiler tells of his beginnings with the Wiener Komödianten, his journeyman years in the German Democratic Republic, his view of theater as a state of exception, and once-in-a-lifetime rehearsal moments.