Theater im Bahnhof

As a grand finale to steirischer herbst ’21, the new production by Theater im Bahnhof stages a flea market and TV-like performance, inspired by a popular reality TV show. The Bares für Wahres—Gala on Sunday night will be also available as a live stream.

Bares für Rares, literally “Cash for Rarities,” is an entertaining program on German television. Guests bring along used objects and antiquities for appraisal and to eventually sell them. In often awkward interactions, host Horst Lichter asks his guests to tell stories about objects they’ve brought along, only to cut them off rudely. Inspired by this apparent lack of interest Theater im Bahnhof provides a space for exactly those stories, shifting the focus from the material to the sentimental value of things.

By weaving complex narratives about objects and their owners into a multilayered performance, they comment on the parallel economy of used goods with surprising stories of provenance in a precarious reality. Both the objects and their stories are collected at a flea market held on the festival’s last weekend punctuated by narrative and theatrical interventions. The weekend culminates in a gala presenting a somewhat direct parody of the TV format, bluntly satirical and poetic at once.

Bio
Theater im Bahnhof (founded 1989, Graz) is a contemporary people’s theater. Its focus is on researching and writing its own productions for both the stage and public space, questioning Austrian identity between popular culture and tradition. The group is famous for their local engagement in Graz for over thirty years as well as their international performances at festivals such as Theater der Welt, Kunstenfestivaldesarts, and Impulse Theater Festival.