Judas

by Lot Vekemans
Using the pastoral letter for Ash Wednesday 2022 from Archbishop Rainer Maria Cardinal Woelki

Freie Theaterszene Düsseldorf
Ev. Tersteegenkirche Düsseldorf
Premiere: 14.05.2022


Direction Marvin Wittiber
Production and collaboration directing Jolan C. Kluge
Stage design and costumes Saskia Holte
Live music and composition Lennart Büchner
Dramaturgical consulting Claus Michael Six
With Valerie Schneider

Funding Jugendfonds Demokratie leben!, Ev. Tersteegenkirche Düsseldorf  


Who was this man who put Jesus on the cross for 30 pieces of silver and whose name has been so powerfully associated with betrayal, deceit and guilt ever since? In Lot Vekemans' monologue, the biblical marginal figure steps out of the shadow of his fateful history. Judas frees himself from the stories that have been told about him for two millennia and intercedes: for his view of things and against the collective condemnation of his person. Lot Vekemans draws a psychogram of a figure who has never been given a voice before. Judas' monologue is a self-assertion that does not play off the questions of responsibility and guilt against each other, but poses them for the first time ever:

„I think we have a one-sided view of heroes, of what we consider to be bigger and higher and better than we are. We love to worship, just as we love to be worshipped. But in both cases, you give your power to someone else. Judas is mocked by people so that they can cleanse their own souls. It is striking that in portraits that have been created over the centuries, Judas has always been depicted as uglier and more evil.“ — Lot Vekemans

The production team led by Marvin Wittiber is interested in the projection surface of Judas and the interplay of guilt and condemnation – both individually and collectively. Last but not least, the production aims to broaden the view of current developments in the institution of the church: the crude processing of the abuse cases, the failures of the disastrous power apparatus and the bigoted rhetoric of those responsible.

Photos Lukas Marvin Thum