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F for Fake (after Orson Welles)

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  • Theatre
  • Independent Production
  • 2008/2009
“As a scenic reflection on the uncatchable promises of the lies-and illusion-machinery of theatre Nikitin’s play cannot be topped.”
— FAZ
“With 'F for Fake', director Boris Nikitin and his gifted performer Malte Scholz polish up the image of a political shopworn topic such as 'media and manipulation' in an absolutely convincing meta-autonomous way. Nikitin and Scholz jazz up all the set pieces, from their own biography to the jazzed-up light show, to such an extent that, on the one hand, the copy of the copy of the copy suddenly exudes an unbeatable air of authenticity (…) Finally someone indeed questions the structural point that makes a content and a media relevant for each other.”
— Theater heute
“A devilish-genious evening, that has been developed by the director Boris Nikitin and his performer Malte Scholz. It has the power to turn whole audiences into euphoria.”
— Tagesanzeiger
“'F for Fake' is the concentrated result of the strongly conceptual Tour d´Horizon which “Woyzeck” still was as a pile of material. With “Fake” we see a departure from there to an intelligent as well as emphatic, ironic as well as authentic, a theatrically reflected as well as richly symbolic work. This is a real development toward a specific theatrical language which is both complex and comprehensible. This prize is to give an impulse for many more departures.”
— Laudatio zum Dietmar N. Schmidt-Preis bei Impulse '09

Events

    • 12 November 2010
      • Theater Neumarkt
    • 10 November 2010
      • Theater Neumarkt
    • 7 September 2010
      • Festival bestOFFStyria, Graz
    • 12 – 14 February 2010
      • Mousonturm, Frankfurt
    • 5 December 2009
      • Ringlokschuppen, Mülheim a. Ruhr
      • Festival "Impulse"
    • 4 December 2009
      • Prinz Regent-Theater, Bochum
      • Festival "Impulse"
    • 28 November 2009
      • FFT Düsseldorf
      • Festival "Impulse"
    • 23 May 2009
      • i-camp, München
    • 24 – 26 April 2009
      • Mousonturm, Frankfurt
      • Festival "plateaux"

Artistic works → F for Fake (after Orson Welles)

Boris Nikitin's directing and Malte Scholz's performance begin as a copy of "Woyzeck". The same person, the same costume, the same space. Everything is both real and unreal at the same time. What begins as a conceptual artistic gesture mutates over the course of 70 minutes into an intoxicating ride through the theatre tunnel, including a fascist propaganda speech, blurring the boundaries between the documentary and the fake, a baroque water feature and a howling kettle. The Zürcher Tagesanzeiger describes the performance as a "drug". 



"F for Fake" is Boris Nikitin's graduate production at the Institute of Applied Theatre Studies. As with "Woyzeck", the co-authorship with Malte Scholz is one of the key elements of the production. Scholz not only contributes artistic texts, but also biographical material. The dream-changing, constantly transforming identity of the stage character "Malte Scholz", who is both himself and the opposite, becomes the theatrical pulse of the evening. "F wie Fälschung" is Nikitin's first attempt at an alternative concept to the model of documentary identity that is increasingly being seen on German-language theatre stages at the time.
"F for Fake" contrasts this model with a concept of potentiality, in which the human being continually escapes any form of definition and linguistic representation.
This refusal of determination will be most consistently realised in 2016 with "Hamlet".

The play was invited to the "Impulse" festival as one of ten outstanding independent theatre works of 2007/2008. Honoured with the Dietmar N. Schmidt Prize.

Conceived, directed and designed by
Boris Nikitin
Performer & texts
Malte Scholz
Dramaturgy
Kris Merken
Technical director
Johanna Seitz

Premiere: 20.7.2008, rehearsal stage, ATW Giessen
Invited to festival "Impulse" 2009.
Priced with Dietmar N. Schmidt-price.

Produced by Boris Nikitin. Cocomissioned by Festival "plateaux".
Supported by Kulturamt Stadt Giessen and Hessischen Theaterakademie.
Elaborated at Institut for Applied Theatre Studies Giessen.

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