Send me up!

Close your eyes and imagine: we are here together at the Schwanenspiegel lake in the afternoon sun. Take a deep breath, forget everything around you for a moment and zoom out. Can you see the lake from above? Can you see the city? Zoom out further and you will see land, rivers, the sea, the continents, tiny from afar!

Now slowly leave the Earth’s atmosphere and float backwards. All sounds fade, except for the lonely beeping of the flashing instruments in the spaceship’s cockpit. The moon shone majestically through the window. With a small crew of more or less experienced astronauts, you are on your way into the unexplored vastness of space. The destination: Planet B – a new, fertile celestial body on which humans could settle when Earth’s resources are exhausted …

From Stanislaw Lem’s “Star Diaries” to the eyewitness accounts of actual cosmonauts to science fiction films and radio plays: Well-known and lesser-known space stories inspired actress Anke Retzlaff and musicians Peter Florian Berndt and Dominik Tremel to embark on an imaginary journey into the vastness of space. Using a variety of musical instruments and microphones, they embark on an expedition to unknown regions of the universe. Together they search for extraterrestrial life, take samples of the sounds of the planets, flee from a hail of meteorites, get lost in the Milky Way and ultimately gain a completely new perspective on the beauty of Earth far from home. “Send me up!” is an extraterrestrial spectacle for all generations – poetic, very humorous and with a good dollop of trash. It is the third production by Retzlaff, Berndt and Tremel to be premiered at asphalt. In 2022, the three performers developed “Wofür es sich zu kämpfen lohnt – Aufzeichnungen eines Hamsters”, and in 2023 they took a musical dive into the Schwanenspiegel with the live radio play “Kopf unter Wasser”.

Anke Retzlaff is an actress, musician and director. In 2021, she was named best up-and-coming artist by “Theater heute” and can also regularly be seen in prominent roles in TV series such as “Tatort” and “Polizeiruf 110”. Peter Florian Berndt is a musician, songwriter and performer. He has already worked as a composer and stage musician at various theatres in Germany. Dominik Tremel works as a freelance musician at theatres and in the field of experimental electro-acoustic music.

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