Schauspielhaus

The Schauspielhaus stands in Erfurt’s old town, beside the Klostergang, a narrow lane in the south-western Altstadt. Built in 1897 by Georg Weidenbach for the Ressource society of officials and merchants, its neo-baroque façade still faces the lane. The building once housed the short-lived Theater des Tanzes under Henn Haas from 1946 to 1949. In 1949 the city took it over and Walter Beck turned it into a playhouse, opening with Goethe’s Iphigenie auf Tauris. By 1956 it had become the Schauspielhaus Erfurt, and in 1957 a smaller studio stage was added. For half a century it remained the city’s principal theatre, especially after the Alte Oper closed in 1997. In 2002 the council decided to close it once the new theatre in the Brühl opened, and the building stood empty until left-wing activists briefly occupied it on 1 May 2013. From 2015 Saxonia Media used parts of the house for episodes of the children’s series Schloss Einstein. In 2015 the council asked the newly formed KulturQuartier Erfurt association to plan a new use, and in November 2016 the first cultural co-operative in Thuringia was founded to restore and run the building. Today the Schauspielhaus is a hive of preparatory work rather than performances. Visitors can still see the ornate stairhall with its marble-effect columns and coffered ceiling. The main auditorium survives behind its proscenium arch, though seats and stage machinery have gone. Alongside the main block, the former Kleine Bühne now serves as a workshop and rehearsal room for the KulturQuartier team. Outside, the Klostergang itself is paved with historic cobblestones and lined with lime-washed walls that echo the 19th-century streetscape.