The making of Berlin

The making of Berlin is a portrait of a city. It is built around the extraordinary story of Friedrich Mohr, a Berliner who was the Berliner Philharmoniker’s stage manager during WWII. The making of Berlin – with live horn music – offers an unfiltered look at BERLIN’s work process. But above all, it tells the story of one of the ‘unbrave’ who failed to stand up when fellow Jewish musicians and friends were expelled from the orchestra. 

In this final part of its city cycle, BERLIN helps Mohr to realize an as yet unfulfilled dream. At the end of WWII, the conductor of the Philharmonic decided to perform Siegfried’s Funeral March from Wagner’s Götterdämmerung one last time. The performance would be broadcast live on German state radio. Rehearsing with the entire orchestra in one location soon proved too dangerous due to ongoing bombing. So the conductor divided the orchestra into seven segments and had them rehearse in separate bunkers. Faltering (recording) technology threw a spanner in the works. Mohr’s ultimate wish is to perform the technical tour de force as initially planned seventy-five years after the date. The Götterdämmerung will be played from seven bunkers simultaneously and can be heard in its entirety on the radio. A daring feat for which BERLIN called on, among others, radio station Klara, the orchestra of Opera Ballet Vlaanderen and German actor Martin Wuttke (known from Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds).

During the creation process, the collective is followed for a behind-the-scenes documentary that exposes inaccuracies in Mohr’s story and questions how far the truth can be stretched in the search for closure. Mohr’s portrait still raises the question of how long we can remain silent in the face of the suffering that continues to unfold before our eyes. 

Selected for Het TheaterFestival (2023) as one of the best performances of the season. Ranked among the Top 10 best productions of 2022 by Belgian newspapers De Standaard and De Morgen.