Lucy Wilke discusses her artistic work and the production SCORES THAT SHAPED OUR FRIENDSHIP, which will be featured at the asphalt Festival 2022.
– 22 June 2022
Lucy Wike is a singer, actress, dancer, author and director. She writes screenplays and directs short films and plays. She performs throughout Germany with her band BLIND AND LAME. She has spinal muscular atrophy and uses a wheelchair. Wilke is a trained speaker and singer. She received her stage training at the International Munich Art Lab. As a performer, she has appeared on stage in the musical EXTAZE, as the White Swan Princess in the Abart dance ensemble’s interpretation of Swan Lake, in the theatre performance Fucking Disabled, in Anthropomorphia, and she played the title role in Phaidra by Monster Truck. Lucy Wilke sang and performed solo in the multimedia installation RE:CONSTRUCTION by UN-LABEL at the Athens State Opera and the Cologne Opera. She worked on a new performance in various European countries with the international production Lands of Concerts. For her own dance debut SCORES THAT SHAPED OUR FRIENDSHIP together with Paweł Duduś, Wilke received the DER FAUST theatre award in 2020 in the category Best Actress Dance, and the piece was invited to the Berlin Theatre Meeting. Since autumn 2020, Lucy Wilke has been a permanent member of the ensemble at the Munich Kammerspiele.
Your production SCORES THAT SHAPED OUR FRIENDSHIP was invited to the 2021 Berlin Theatre Meeting, and in 2020 you were awarded the German Theatre Prize DER FAUST in the category Best Performer: Dance. Do you see yourself as a dancer or a performer?
I see myself as a dancer, among other things. Basically, I am an artist who uses different forms of expression.
You are now firmly established in the theatre world and are a member of the Munich Kammerspiele ensemble. Has this changed your self-perception as an artist, and to what extent is this space for development interesting to you?
The Munich Kammerspiele is a great school for me. It’s nice to work with different directors and to develop a routine through frequent performances. However, I also love the independent scene very much! For me, it’s more personal.
How would you describe the differences between your artistic, experimental work in the independent scene and that in a municipal cultural institution? Does a municipal theatre like the Münchner Kammerspiele also offer space for experimentation?
I don’t know what it’s like in other municipal theatres. The Kammerspiele is already experimentally oriented. Of course, there isn’t as much room for personal expression, but we are always encouraged to get involved and also to act as co-authors. I think it depends on how much personal commitment you have.
SCORES THAT SHAPED OUR FRIENDSHIP is an ensemble piece by three people from very different genres. How did Paweł Duduś, Kim Twiddle and you develop it together, collectively as an independent theatre production?
Paweł and I started developing the piece. We had a budget for the independent scene. Kim then joined us and we continued to develop the piece together.
SCORES is a very intimate, tender pas de deux. The premiere took place in February 2020, a few days before the first lockdown, and then the coronavirus pandemic spread. Were you able to perform the piece at all after that?
Miraculously, we always managed to avoid the lockdowns and were actually able to perform the piece. However, not in the original version, which was very close to the audience. I hope that we will be able to return to the old format in the future.
What role would you like to play?
I would like to play a man. Or a classical piece. That would be a big contrast to what I’m doing now.
