Theater Rampe

Theater Rampe is a production house for contemporary theatre, performance, dance and music in Stuttgart. It occupies the former depot of the Stuttgart rack railway on Filderstraße, a 1907 neubaroque building that once served as the lower station for the ‘Zacke’ trains. The yellow rack railway cars still roll into the foyer each evening and remain there overnight. The theatre was founded in 1984 by Regula Gerber and Alexander Seer, who built an ensemble of around twenty actors and presented classical works alongside new German drama. Since 1998 the house has been led by successive artistic directors—Eva Hosemann, then Marie Bues and Martina Grohmann—who expanded its focus to site-specific productions and socially engaged themes. In 2019 Bues and Grohmann received the national Theatre Prize of the Federal Republic for transforming the Rampe into an internationally recognised centre for free theatre of all disciplines. Inside, the converted depot offers a flexible performance space where new plays are premiered and resident authors develop work. The adjoining Bar Rakete serves as a pop-culture hub for southern Stuttgart, hosting concerts, parties and the monthly Montage talks on culture and society. Beyond the stage, the theatre runs community projects such as Volks*theater, inviting neighbours from the Marienviertel to create performances together.