Angel of Destruction

Four actors are waiting on a film set for shooting to begin. A remake of their blockbuster hit *Ghosts* is in the works. But the film crew simply isn’t turning up. After failed attempts to contact the management and take the filming into their own hands, the actors realise they can no longer leave the location. An invisible barrier seems to be trapping them on set. Left to their own devices, they are confronted with the imperfection of human existence: age, lost loves, envy, illness and mortality become visible as if under a magnifying glass. The bitter question arises as to what, if anything, would even be waiting for them outside. For AI is in the process of conquering the world and seems to be stopping at nothing, not even at the gates of Hollywood.

Against the backdrop of this contemporary phenomenon, ENGEL DER VERNICHTUNG adapts the plot of Luis Buñuel’s surrealist film classic *The Exterminating Angel* (1962) for the stage. The director
Jonas Bernetta and his team explore the fear of losing meaning and subjectivity when everything that defines a human being is replaced by AI. Accompanied throughout by a live camera, the theatre stage becomes a film set, and the performance a live film.

The star-studded cast includes Vera Bommer, who was last seen on our stage in FISCHER FRITZ and MYTHOS, as well as Paul Behren, who is currently shining in the title role of Frank Castorf’s “Hamlet” at the Hamburg Schauspielhaus.

○ “A successful production […]. Entertaining, multi-layered in content and well thought-out.” SRF