Villa Aurora Events Archive
September 2024
My Mother's Courage: Play by George Tabori with Thomas Bockelmann and Sigrun Schneider-Kaethner
Villa Aurora (520 Paseo Miramar, Pacific Palisades, CA 90272)
Information
George Tabori’s intimate two-character play “My Mother’s Courage” is shown for the first time in Los Angeles! Tabori, a Hungarian Jew, moved 1947 to Los Angeles where he became a script writer and part of the exile literary scene that met regularly at Lion Feuchtwanger’s home. Brecht was among them who inspired Tabori towards the theater.
George Tabori’s homage to his mother is, by extension, homage to all mothers whose courage, wit, and will to live gave their children the opportunity to come to terms with their own trauma. The ripple effects of the European cataclysms of the 20th century that destroyed generations are felt this very day, and the play is as relevant now with the world reeling in wars of aggression. The play was written in 1971 when he returned to Germany and premiered in 1979 at the Kammerspiele in Munich under Tabori’s own direction. While George Tabori’s works revolve around such issues as racism, Nazism, the Holocaust, and genocide, he uses satire, bold humor, and Brechtian theatrical techniques to sharpen the horrific absurdity of these political excrescences.
This production is a guest performance by the Staatstheater Kassel.
Actors
Sigrun Schneider-Kaethner, born in Posen and raised in Berlin, completed her training as an actor at the Max Reinhardt Seminar in Berlin. This was followed by engagements in Germany and Switzerland as well as touring theater guest performances in Scandinavia, Italy and Israel. Among others, she played in "Jacke wie Hose" (M. Karge) and "Kassandra" by Christa Wolf (authorized self-interpretation). Since 1995 she has appeared on stage with Thomas Bockelmann in "My Mother's Courage" by George Tabori. Schneider-Kaethner lives by Max Reinhardt's motto: "The actor is a person who has put his childhood in his pocket in order to keep on playing".
Thomas Bockelmann is a German actor and theater director born in Lüneburg and raised in Frankfurt. He was the artistic director of the Staatstheater Kassel for almost 20 years and directed over 80 plays. His production of My Mother's Courage by George Tabori has been performed more than 150 times. In 2022 it had its American premiere at the Torn Page Theater New York.
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Shuttle service departs from Los Liones Drive & Sunset Boulevard starting at 4:00 pm.
Tour Dates Biliana Voutchkova
Los Angeles and North America
Biliana Voutchkova is a thoroughly engaged interdisciplinary artist, violinist, composer-performer, improviser, and curator working internationally as a soloist and in collaboration with renowned artists. She is a faculty member of the Bern Academy of Arts (HKB) and founder and curator of the DARA String Festival. Through the prism of listening, she explores states of spontaneity and intuitive resonance embodied in her multifaceted activities. These include concert performances of improvisation, contemporary composition, and original/site-specific work, exhibitions, long durational and multidisciplinary performances, audiovisual works, and installation formats with a focus on the interconnection between inner world and sound space.
CONCERTS IN LOS ANGELES
Concert at the Museum of Jurassic Technology
September 8, 7:30 p.m. (PT)
Composer and performer Biliana Voutchkova plays a new site specific solo at one of LA's most magical places. More information here
Concert at the Coaxial Arts Foundation: Inner Ear Energy Landscape
September 13, 8 p.m. (PT)
In this performance Biliana Voutchkova plays with Jessika Kenney and Austin Lee Larkin at the Coaxial Arts Foundation, a non-proft, multip-disciplinary media arts organization devoted to media, sound and performance art. More Information and tickets here
NORTH AMERICA TOUR DATES
September, 11: University of the Pacific, Stockton,CA / Masterclass and concert with Kyle Bruckmann
September, 12: UC Berkeley, CA / Masterclass and concert with Ken Ueno
September, 20: Constellation, Chicago, IL / Mixed groups with musicians from Instigation Festival and DARA Strings
September 21: Museum of Surgical Science, Chicago, IL / DARA Strings with Katinka Kleijn, Isidora Edwards, Gabby Fluke-Mogul and special guest Michael Zerang
September 22: AS220, Providence, RI / Small groups with Charmaine Lee, Bonnie Jones and Florence Wallis
September, 24: Goethe Institut Boston, MA / Solo and duo with Charmaine Lee
September, 25: Roulette, Brooklyn, NY / Solo and group set with DARA Strings / Joanna Mattrey, Miya Masaoka, Katinka Kleijn and Isidora Edwards
September, 27: Bard College, NY / Masterclass, in collaboration with Sarah Hennies
September, 28: Headlong, Philadelphia, PA / People Music’s Supply / Now is Now, duo with Isidora Edwards
I'M YOUR MAN - Film Screening and Discussion
Goethe-Institut Los Angeles
Join us for a screening of Maria Schrader's film I'M YOUR MAN (2021), followed by a discussion between author Emma Braslavsky and translator Holly Yanacek.
SCHEDULE:
6:00pm Doors open.
6:30pm Welcoming + Introduction
6:45pm Screening of I'M YOUR MAN + discussion w/ Author Emma Braslavsky + translator Holly Yanacek.
9:30pm End of Event
About the Book
Dr. Alma Felser is a famous couples therapist and one of the last people who still believes that love exists only between real humans. She rejects the comfort of hubot love. When her long-term relationship fails, she secretly orders herself one of these androids, naturally designed to be the ideal partner she always promotes in her articles. At first Alma is intoxicated, but soon she realizes that Tom is the partner she wants, but not the one she needs.
"In a compelling literary form, Emma Braslavsky […] asks to what extent the boundary between human thought and artificial intelligence is beginning to dissolve, especially in an era of radical individualism."
- Christoph Schröder - German TV Channel SWR
About the Film
Alma (Maren Eggert), an accomplished researcher at the famous Pergamon Museum in Berlin, leads a team studying ancient cuneiform writing. In order to obtain research funds for her work, she grudgingly agrees to participate in an extraordinary study, one in which she is an experimental variable: For three weeks, she must live with a humanoid android tailored specifically to her unique character and needs. But Alma is unsentimental and skeptical when she meets Tom (Dan Stevens), a robot almost totally indistinguishable from a flesh-and-blood man. Tom’s algorithm is programmed to learn from Alma, so that he may adapt and change to fulfill his programming to become her perfect partner. While he’s a technical marvel created solely to make her happy, his initial attempts are awkward and ridiculous, and Alma is horrified. But his constant analysis of Alma’s reactions allows him to adapt and cater to her real longings. I’m Your Man is a comically romantic tale about the questions of love, longing, and what makes us human.
Germany (2021), 108 min., German with English Subtitles
Director: Maria Schrader, Screenplay: Maria Schrader, Jan Schomburg, Emma Braslavsky, based on Braslavsky’s Die Nacht war bleich, die Lichter blinkten, Cinematography: Benedikt Neuenfels, Cast: Maren Eggert, Dan Stevens, Sandra Hüller, Hans Löw, Wolfgang Hübsch, Production Company: Letterbox Filmproduktion GmbH (Hamburg).
Participants
Emma Braslavsky is a writer, curator, and director. The meaning and future of humanity are her main topics. She has published multiple award-winning novels, audio art, art works, and exhibitions, such as the story "Ich bin dein Mensch," a spin-off from the award-winning novel Die Nacht war bleich, die Lichter blinkten (2019), which was nominated for the German Science Fiction Award and was made into a film. She published her fifth novel ,Erdling, in November 2023. She currently lives and works in Berlin.
During her residency, Emma Braslavsky will be working on her novel Gummi (Rubber), which tells Charles Goodyear's vision of the future from the perspective of his two wives, Clarissa Beecher Goodyear and Fanny Wardell Goodyear, thereby putting them and his family front and center. Through this shift in perspective, she hopes to uncover a new facet of what the future is made of. In the U.S., she is currently planning her research on the two women whose influence on her husband's success has so far gone unnoticed.
Dr. Holly Yanacek is associate professor of German at James Madison University. Her scholarship in German literary studies focuses on emotion, narration, gender, care, and posthumanism. She is a former Fulbrighter who still has a metaphorical suitcase in Berlin. Words Without Borders has published her first literary translation of Emma Braslavsky’s short story „The VANISHÄVEN Furniture System: A Demonstration"
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LOCATION:
Goethe-Institut Los Angeles
1901 W. 7th St. Suite AB,
Los Angeles, CA 90057
Attendance to this event is free and open to the public.
Partner
An event in collaboration with our partner institution Thomas Mann House and the Goethe-Institut Los Angeles.
