„Fly with me! Fly with me!“, calls Albi, the Alpine swift, who nests under the roof of the Linden Museum during the summer months. On your flight through the permanent exhibitions, you will encounter the transparent kangaroo, hear about an extinct bird, and can listen to the conversation with Seraa, the elephant. Whether in pictures or clothing, made from wood, ceramics, and stone – the animals and their representations tell of the coexistence of humans and animals. This relationship is not always straightforward. On one hand, many animals are admired, revered, and appreciated as companions or domestic and farm animals, while on the other hand, their habitats are also destroyed and they are hunted or displaced.

In the exhibition, illustrator Promina Shrestha brings the animals on the objects to life through her images. During the listening and stamping rally, you will discover together with Albi what the animals have to say, solve puzzles, and collect stamps.

€ 4/3 including permanent exhibitions
Children up to 18 years free

Tue to Sat 10 AM - 5 PM / Sun and holidays 10 AM - 6 PM / Closed on Dec 24, 25, and 31

YOU ARE MY MOTHER
by Joop Admiraal (translated into German by Monika The)

On June 15, 2004, this play with Stephan Moos as the performer had its premiere at the Theaterhaus. Now, 16 years later, after a revision of the script, Stephan Moos will once again showcase his great acting versatility on stage. The son visits his mother in a nursing home. The routine of their weekly encounters with their constant ritual fades into an intense, loving dialogue, infused with subtle humor and a melancholic mood. The drama achieves an impressive form with the portrayal of mother and son by a single actor. The play, first performed in 1981 in Amsterdam, has not lost its significance. The vulnerability of elderly people, their dependency on their loved ones, the growing lack of zest for life, and the controversy surrounding the premature termination of the decay process are themes that have become even more relevant since the play's inception, gaining new urgency in the times of Corona.

"It is a sophisticated interplay between the characters that requires the utmost concentration and precision. With Stephan Moss, every detail is in place... 'You Are My Mother' is also pure acting art, exciting theater with intriguing characters."
Stuttgarter Zeitung, June 18, 2004

Performer: Stephan Moos | Director (Revised Version): Werner Schretzmeier | Set/Costume Design: Gudrun Schretzmeier | Performance Rights: Litag Theaterverlag GmbH & Co. KG

If someone fails as grandiosely and comically in thoughts, words, and actions as Waghubinger, all he can do is to keep getting up, give himself a push, and sit on the barstool again. Since planning for the future has never really worked out for him, this time he looks back and a little to the side. The best stories, for which this character is loved, are told once again and intertwined with new anecdotes and attempts to explain, creating a roller coaster of emotions. Waghubinger thinks and talks in a way that barely touches reality, making it sometimes clearer to see than in the theater of one's own world.

The famous mirror he holds up this time is a broken rearview mirror from parking, and those who want can see themselves, the world, or simply another Waghubinger in it. Philosophical grumbling and loving banter.

Doors open: 7:00 PM

Opera by Alban Berg

Why is this opera called Lulu? Dr. Schön, for instance, calls our protagonist Mignon. Walter Schwarz, the painter, names her Eva, Dr. Goll called her Nelly. A few, like Schigolch and Geschwitz, actually call her Lulu. What her real name is, nobody knows, and as unknown as her name is, so is her essence. From the darkness of her incognito, she consistently evades any role assignment. She refuses to conform to the role of a wife, as well as that of a friend. She cannot be defined as a lover, and certainly not as a whore. Yet, she tells us that she never wanted to seem anything in the world other than what she has been taken for. And she was never taken in the world for anything other than what she is. Here the cat bites its tail and Eva, Lulu, Mignon, or Nelly slip away from us like the electron from the quantum physicist. What remains is an unresolvable blur. Still, Lulu's – let’s stick to the name – effect is undeniable. The blood trail of no less than seven corpses she drags behind her throughout the opera. From her hand in murdering Dr. Schön, to the contract killing of the athlete, each one a provoked suicide (painter) and medical emergency (Dr. Goll), down to a few collateral dead like Alwa or Geschwitz, and finally herself – it’s all included.

If we want to get to the bottom of her, we have no choice but to invite this figure back onto a theater stage and try to shed light on another piece of the puzzle for her identification under the spotlight. And even if we shouldn’t understand too much in the process, another evening with Lulu might at least provide us with a small hint of what cathartic or destructive or whatever type of task the nameless force inherent in her was assigned in the web of human shortcomings.

A production of the Opera School of HMDK Stuttgart
With the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra and the Erasmus Ensemble Stuttgart

Musical Direction: Bernhard Epstein
Direction: Bernd Schmitt
Set Design: Annette Wolf

30 minutes before the performance, there will be an introductory talk in the Studio of the Wilhelma Theater. Admission is free.

In 2024, as part of the organ matinees of the district music office, Mona Hartmann thrilled audiences at the Maulbronn Grenzing organ – good reason to invite her for the upcoming season of the monastery concerts. For this, she has selected a wonderful, spectacular concert program.

The concert begins with the famous overture to Richard Wagner's Tannhäuser. This transcription powerfully and passionately conveys the drama of the romantic opera onto the organ. Next comes another fascinating arrangement with Camille Saint-Saëns’ Danse macabre, which impressively captures both the eerie atmosphere of the dance of death and its lively rhythms. Contemporary composer Thierry Escaich, who himself performed on the Grenzing organ in 2021, brings fresh energy to the evening with his Trois Poêmes. The three pieces Eaux natales, Le Masque, and Vers l’espérance showcase the Frenchman's unique ability to combine colors of sound and emotions. The crowning conclusion of the concert is Julius Reubke's monumental Sonata on Psalm 94 – a masterpiece of organ romanticism, notable for its profound spirituality and technical sophistication. The emotional intensity of the psalm reflects the composer’s visions, allowing the audience to immerse themselves in a world full of grandeur and contemplation.

Maxim Maurice is now among the most successful magicians in Germany and has made a name for himself nationally and internationally, especially in the field of grand illusions. His references include performances at major festivals in Paris, Budapest, and Athens, as well as engagements on the Aida and Tui cruise ships. Be captivated and experience, among other things, when he makes a person float or seemingly pierces his partner with 16 swords. He promises a humorous and entertaining show for the whole family, during which he even predicts the lottery numbers.

Image: Dirk Gulden

Doors open: 6:45 PM

Warsaw, 1939. The Polski Theater is banned from performing a Nazi farce. Instead, they quickly put on "Hamlet." During the famous monologue “To be or not to be,” the pilot Sobinsky leaves the hall – and goes straight to the dressing room of the leading actress. Her husband, the famous actor Josef Tura, is furious. But when war breaks out on the grand stage of the world and the Polish resistance is in danger, they must stick together.
And suddenly the theater troupe is no longer performing for the audience but for their lives.

The play “Sein oder Nichtsein” – based on the film by Ernst Lubitsch – is about war and Nazi terror. In contrast, there stands the cohesion of a theater ensemble that bravely and cunningly opposes injustice. A plea for civil courage through the means of comedy.

“The film, which premiered in the USA in 1942 by Jewish Berliner Ernst Lubitsch, has become a perceptive document of its time that holds its own against Chaplin's THE GREAT DICTATOR and has already proven over 60 years ago that one can laugh at Nazis without downplaying their crimes.” – Sächsische Zeitung

“One of the best films by Ernst Lubitsch, which, as a biting satire, portrays the henchmen of National Socialism as grotesque actors and honors the acting troupe as tragicomic heroes.”
– Lexikon des internationalen Films

*Wheelchair users and groups of 10 or more please contact our service center directly at (0711-227700).

The magazine Spiegel calls him a “great storyteller,” and the British Independent compares him to Kafka and Kleist – we are talking about bestseller author Ferdinand von Schirach.

In his new play, he deals with the dilemma that in cases of sexual violence, it is almost always a matter of one person's word against another's. In February 2024, a million viewers watched the television version of this courtroom drama.

Katharina Schlüter, a successful TV presenter, accuses her former lover, the entrepreneur Dr. Christian Tiede, of having raped her. There are no witnesses for this crime, and so the criminal trial revolves around the question of credibility. Both for the accused and the plaintiff, a lot is at stake: their future personal and professional lives, as well as their reputations, largely depend on whose version the court will confirm.

The play shows how complicated it is to reach a verdict in such cases and how closely it is linked to societal values and prevailing prejudices. “What should one think when, after exhausting all evidence, only remains: 'She says. He says.'?" says Ferdinand von Schirach.

After “Terror,” “Taboo,” and “God,” another work by the successful author is now on our schedule – with a first-class cast: including audience award winners Sabine Fürst and Ralf Stech as the former couple.

Performances from June 13 to July 18, 2025

With Sabine Christiane Dotzer, Selda Falke, Magdalena Flade, Sabine Fürst, Marius Hubel, Stefanie Klimkait, Maja Müller, Ralf Stech, among others.
Directed by Martin Schulze
Set and costumes by Ariane Scherpf
Video by Christopher Bühler
Dramaturgy by Susanne Schmitt

*Wheelchair users and groups of 10 or more please contact our service center directly (0711-227700).

This comedy is a cult classic! Great punchlines, lots of music, and six actors – including audience favorite Andreas Klaue – who go (almost) to the limits!

Since sales have been weak for the local automotive industry and its suppliers, all friends in the group have gradually lost their jobs. The six guys are broke, without prospects, and they aren't doing well with women either. But then they come up with a brilliant idea: they want to form a male striptease group to make big money. The fact that none of them have model figures and that they all have no idea about dancing doesn't bother them at first. But soon it becomes clear that shedding all their clothes is something that needs to be learned as well...

A grandiose fun that nonetheless has some thought-provoking undertones: six men fighting against the looming unemployment with wit and inventiveness. How far will they go?

“Some materials are simply so good that they can stand out wonderfully both on stage and on screen,” wrote the Süddeutsche Zeitung about the comedy, which was also successfully filmed under the title “The Full Monty.” Director Murat Yeginer, who already had the audience in tears with laughter during “Das Fräulein Wunder,” has brought the play to the here and now – and to Stuttgart. A lively comedy about men seeking new ways to keep up with the times!

Performances from May 16 to July 6, 2025

With Dieter Gring, Irfan Kars, Andreas Klaue, Aron Keleta, Gideon Rapp, Ambrogio Vinella
Directed by Murat Yeginer
Set and costumes by Beate Zoff
Choreography by Sorina Kiefer
Dramaturgy by Annette Weinmann

What belongs in a time capsule for people in 100 years? This exciting question has been answered by our youth club – and of course, Harry Potter cannot be missing!

While designing the exhibition, the club members became real museum professionals: They wrote texts, developed a rally, created a “magazine” and thought about how they want to present all of it.

Also discover the fascinating future estimates of the mosaic working group and let yourself be surprised by the creative time capsule ideas! 
 
Supported by: BW-Bank and Society for Earth and Ethnology e. V.

Admission free

Tue to Sat from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Sun and holidays from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

„Fly with me! Fly with me!“, calls Albi, the Alpine swift, who nests under the roof of the Linden Museum during the summer months. On your flight through the permanent exhibitions, you will encounter the transparent kangaroo, hear about an extinct bird, and can listen to the conversation with Seraa, the elephant. Whether in pictures or clothing, made from wood, ceramics, and stone – the animals and their representations tell of the coexistence of humans and animals. This relationship is not always straightforward. On one hand, many animals are admired, revered, and appreciated as companions or domestic and farm animals, while on the other hand, their habitats are also destroyed and they are hunted or displaced.

In the exhibition, illustrator Promina Shrestha brings the animals on the objects to life through her images. During the listening and stamping rally, you will discover together with Albi what the animals have to say, solve puzzles, and collect stamps.

€ 4/3 including permanent exhibitions
Children up to 18 years free

Tue to Sat 10 AM - 5 PM / Sun and holidays 10 AM - 6 PM / Closed on Dec 24, 25, and 31

Disasters create a sense of community. In a time of crises and upheavals, we playfully engage with threatening scenarios and develop strategies for the futures ahead with numerous allies. In several locations in the southern part of Stuttgart, we declare a state of emergency – in the end, we have become a sworn community, looking calmly at the city and being prepared for the serious case.

Admittance: 18:15 o'clock

With "Quasi Cool," Sebastian Manz, international soloist, chamber musician, and solo clarinetist with the SWR Symphony Orchestra, presents a program that playfully navigates between jazz, rock, and classical modernity. The title is borrowed from a movement indication of the "Pocket Size Sonata No. 2" by Alec Templeton.

The term "crossover" may carry negative connotations for some, but it applies to this program in the best possible sense. Here, familiar sounds of "classical" music are deliberately worked with, which are then mixed in arrangements by Sebastian Manz with music from Duke Ellington, Elvis Presley, and even AC/DC. In Maulbronn, the works will be performed in a colorful septet lineup with violin, trumpet, clarinet, saxophone/bassoon, piano, and drums. Without denying one's own musical roots, and coupled with endless enthusiasm, humor, and even self-irony, this results in a pretty cool project. Or at least: Nearly cool.

Warsaw, 1939. The Polski Theater is banned from performing a Nazi farce. Instead, they quickly put on "Hamlet." During the famous monologue “To be or not to be,” the pilot Sobinsky leaves the hall – and goes straight to the dressing room of the leading actress. Her husband, the famous actor Josef Tura, is furious. But when war breaks out on the grand stage of the world and the Polish resistance is in danger, they must stick together.
And suddenly the theater troupe is no longer performing for the audience but for their lives.

The play “Sein oder Nichtsein” – based on the film by Ernst Lubitsch – is about war and Nazi terror. In contrast, there stands the cohesion of a theater ensemble that bravely and cunningly opposes injustice. A plea for civil courage through the means of comedy.

“The film, which premiered in the USA in 1942 by Jewish Berliner Ernst Lubitsch, has become a perceptive document of its time that holds its own against Chaplin's THE GREAT DICTATOR and has already proven over 60 years ago that one can laugh at Nazis without downplaying their crimes.” – Sächsische Zeitung

“One of the best films by Ernst Lubitsch, which, as a biting satire, portrays the henchmen of National Socialism as grotesque actors and honors the acting troupe as tragicomic heroes.”
– Lexikon des internationalen Films

Han's Klaffl, a passionate (music) teacher, delves into the widespread clichés about the profession of educators in not less than four cabaret solo programs focusing on teachers, students, and parents.
He unapologetically reveals what really happens behind the closed doors of the teacher's lounge. He dives into the complicated psyche of teachers, provides valuable tips for conducting parent-teacher meetings, and shares the secrets of stress-free teaching. He vividly illustrates the incredible survival strategies that students have developed over the centuries, thus providing previously unseen, deep insights into the last unexplored biotope of our society: the school.

That these insights into the pedagogical subculture were long overdue is evident from the persistent interest shown by teachers, parents, and students in this self-ironic reckoning. But of course, Han's Klaffl, as a gifted – or was it a gracious? – educator, is well aware of the forgetfulness that is as inseparable from the human brain as the meatloaf sandwich is from the school kiosk. And that is why there is now a compact course, a refresher, essentially a Best-of, with which Han's Klaffl fills in any memory gaps. Look forward to an evening with particularly popular numbers from four stage programs! Look forward to a reunion with Gütlich, Gregorius, and the janitor Grantinger! Look forward to a double lesson of frontal teaching with piano and double bass, after which no questions will remain unanswered!

Klaffl knows how to captivate his audience, hold up a mirror to them, and at the same time give their laughing muscles a good workout.
Passauer Neue Presse

A (school) master of cabaret.
Augsburger Allgemeine

There should be more of his kind.
Bonner Rundschau

Doors open: 19:45

Unfortunately, the event has been canceled.

*Wheelchair users and groups of 10 or more please contact our service center directly (0711-227700).

This comedy is a cult classic! Great punchlines, lots of music, and six actors – including audience favorite Andreas Klaue – who go (almost) to the limits!

Since sales have been weak for the local automotive industry and its suppliers, all friends in the group have gradually lost their jobs. The six guys are broke, without prospects, and they aren't doing well with women either. But then they come up with a brilliant idea: they want to form a male striptease group to make big money. The fact that none of them have model figures and that they all have no idea about dancing doesn't bother them at first. But soon it becomes clear that shedding all their clothes is something that needs to be learned as well...

A grandiose fun that nonetheless has some thought-provoking undertones: six men fighting against the looming unemployment with wit and inventiveness. How far will they go?

“Some materials are simply so good that they can stand out wonderfully both on stage and on screen,” wrote the Süddeutsche Zeitung about the comedy, which was also successfully filmed under the title “The Full Monty.” Director Murat Yeginer, who already had the audience in tears with laughter during “Das Fräulein Wunder,” has brought the play to the here and now – and to Stuttgart. A lively comedy about men seeking new ways to keep up with the times!

Performances from May 16 to July 6, 2025

With Dieter Gring, Irfan Kars, Andreas Klaue, Aron Keleta, Gideon Rapp, Ambrogio Vinella
Directed by Murat Yeginer
Set and costumes by Beate Zoff
Choreography by Sorina Kiefer
Dramaturgy by Annette Weinmann

*Wheelchair users and groups of 10 or more please contact our service center directly at (0711-227700).

The magazine Spiegel calls him a “great storyteller,” and the British Independent compares him to Kafka and Kleist – we are talking about bestseller author Ferdinand von Schirach.

In his new play, he deals with the dilemma that in cases of sexual violence, it is almost always a matter of one person's word against another's. In February 2024, a million viewers watched the television version of this courtroom drama.

Katharina Schlüter, a successful TV presenter, accuses her former lover, the entrepreneur Dr. Christian Tiede, of having raped her. There are no witnesses for this crime, and so the criminal trial revolves around the question of credibility. Both for the accused and the plaintiff, a lot is at stake: their future personal and professional lives, as well as their reputations, largely depend on whose version the court will confirm.

The play shows how complicated it is to reach a verdict in such cases and how closely it is linked to societal values and prevailing prejudices. “What should one think when, after exhausting all evidence, only remains: 'She says. He says.'?" says Ferdinand von Schirach.

After “Terror,” “Taboo,” and “God,” another work by the successful author is now on our schedule – with a first-class cast: including audience award winners Sabine Fürst and Ralf Stech as the former couple.

Performances from June 13 to July 18, 2025

With Sabine Christiane Dotzer, Selda Falke, Magdalena Flade, Sabine Fürst, Marius Hubel, Stefanie Klimkait, Maja Müller, Ralf Stech, among others.
Directed by Martin Schulze
Set and costumes by Ariane Scherpf
Video by Christopher Bühler
Dramaturgy by Susanne Schmitt

From the search for the ideal world - Beethoven, Schiller, and the European Idea. In fragments and visual scenes, composer and poet approach the vision of freedom and equality, which finds its projection surface for the pursuit of European identity in Beethoven's music. A visual journey through European history and insights into the biographies of the two artists, Ludwig van Beethoven and Friedrich von Schiller, combined with excerpts from Beethoven's 9th Symphony into a theatrical diorama.
A solo for two. Performed by Andreas Weiner.

Duration of the performance: approx. 70 minutes, no intermission

Very different from the various forms of modern poetry in Europe, modern US-American poetry refers to the traditions of the past – without the compulsion for avant-garde breaks, without obligation to inherited forms. However, it comes with a grass-stem green enthusiasm for novelty and a relaxed permission to connect with transatlantic remnants of identity. Additionally, as a dissent, counter-sound, and subculture, the influences of indigenous and Black positions are incorporated. A mix that seems almost improbable in the current political climate, yet is extremely fruitful. And a valuable treasure that we want to uncover together. With (vegetarian) hot dogs and US-American drinks, we invite you to read and discuss the texts together.

Supported by the funding initiative Kulturkessel