Selbstportrait zwischen Steppe und Wald

Anyone who has experienced Alexej Lochmann on stage will never forget his captivating acting. Lochmann’s background is interesting and rather confusing in view of current political events: born in Qaranghandy in Kazakhstan, he grew up in Hamburg in the 1990s as the child of a family of ethnic German immigrants with a Russian-German father and a Ukrainian-Russian mother. His family was then, and still is today, forced to reinvent itself multiple times, having to leave places that had become familiar over and over again. And despite this, or perhaps precisely because of this, they have always brought pieces of their old homeland with them to their new homes. Lochmann’s solo evening is about a family’s dispersion in all directions and across several countries and ideologies, about the events that triggered their moves and resettlements, about affiliations and cultural idiosyncrasies.

How many trees does it actually take to turn the steppe into a forest?

Alexej Lochmann was a member of the Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus ensemble from 2016 to 2020 and has been a member of the Deutsches Theater Berlin ensemble since the 23/24 season. Siberian-born director Nikita Betekhtin had to leave his homeland shortly after the start of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine due to political statements that put him in danger. He met the actor Alexei Lochmann at the Deutsches Theater, where they developed this theatre evening together.