Director: Yumin Ao

Playwright: Fabian Hartje

Cast: Johanna Schwung, Viktoria Labitzke

Time: July 6, 2021

Venue: Deutsches Theater in Göttingen

Plärren is a text without characters or dialogue, consisting only of streams of words, abundant onomatopoeia, fragmented sentences, and a note from the playwright about his inspiration for writing it: according to news reports, the world’s most stable permafrost in Siberia is thawing due to climate change, reviving 24,000-year-old bdelloid rotifers. The playwright mentioned that he would not participate in rehearsals but planned to attend the final performance. I was, of course, delighted by this level of trust, and even more excited when he gave me full freedom to modify the script as I saw fit.

For the stage adaptation, I introduced characters and a storyline to what was essentially a plotless, seemingly meaningless text. Through a second wave of creative development, it transformed into the story of a “mad” biologist in a laboratory. The production incorporated elements of Japanese avant-garde dance, Butoh, capturing the cries of life on the edge of death, the search for liberation of body and mind, and the subtle emergence of new organic forms at critical moments.

Interestingly, although rotifers reproduce asexually, they can acquire (or “steal”) new genetic material from other organisms, perhaps contributing to their remarkable resilience and ability to revive after millennia. This biological quirk became a central metaphor in the piece, raising questions about the continuity of human life along two parallel pathways: biological inheritance and cultural legacy. It reflects on the finite nature of our physical existence, the eternity of the afterlife, and the potential for spiritual reincarnation.