Wed., March 25, 12:00 noon Live Segal Screening of Milo Rau Film THE NEW GOSPEL (2020)

In Person

SEGAL SCREENING with

The New Gospel

by Milo Rau /IIPM & NTGent

Wednesday, March 25,

12:00 noon

IN PERSON

Segal Theatre Center, 5th Ave. @ 34 Str.

Livestreamed via HowlRound

Country: Germany | Running Time: 106 min| Language: Italian/Engl. Subtitles  | Year Of Release: 2020

What would Jesus preach in the 21st century? Who would his disciples be? And how would today’s bearers of secular and spiritual power respond to the return and provocations of the most influential prophet and social revolutionary in human history? With “The new Gospel”, Milo Rau is staging a “Revolt of Dignity”. Led by political activist Yvan Sagnet, the movement is fighting for the rights of migrants who came to Europe across the Mediterranean to be enslaved on the tomato fields in Italy.

“For nearly 20 years now, I have dealt with the contradictions of the global economy as well as the role Europe plays in it through plays, films and books. In the “Europe Trilogy” (2014-16), the stories of actors from 13 countries, from Belgium to Russia to Kurdistan and Syria, were put together and formed a European story – a “political psychoanalysis of our continent” (Libération) for which we held castings from Erbil to Jerusalem and Athens to Brussels and Paris. For the movie “The Congo Tribunal” (2017), I created a global economy tribunal in the East Congolese civil war zone, where European and Canadian commodity companies are driving away hundreds of thousands of people under the eyes of the UN. Miners and managers, rebels and government politicians answered questions from a jury of national and international lawyers. The project, which was nominated for the Swiss as well as the German Film Academy Award, led to the dismissal of two ministers and even the governor of the Congolese mining province of South Kivu.

With THE NEW GOSPEL I now bring together both types of projects: the large- scale criticism of an unjust world order in which Europe plays a central role; and working with a layperson ensemble and their stories and biographies, which emerged from a wide and extensive casting. In addition, there is a long lasting interest in the imagery of the Bible, which I have already dealt with in my Pasolini adaptation “The 120 Days of Sodom” (2017, Schauspielhaus Zurich), my large-scale faith project “The Ghent Altarpiece” (2018, NT Gent), as well as in “Empire” (2016, Schaubühne Berlin), the third part of the “Europe Trilogy” with Maia Morgenstern, who played the role of Maria in Mel Gibson’s bibliographic film “The Passion of the Christ”.

When southern Italian Matera was appointed as the “European Capital of Culture 2019”, I immediately had a concept in mind: a new Jesus film, mixing the strong cinematographic tradition of the region with its modern reality. My proposal to do „my” version of the New Testament where Pasolini and Mel Gibson did the 2 most-known Jesus films of all time, mixing professional actors with activists, immediately met with open ears from the curators. When I went there the first time, the exceptional antique peace of the city convinced me immediately to shoot a Jesus movie here. The aim was to maintain its original spirit as a Passion story of the socially underprivileged, the poor, the unemployed, the outcasts, the marginalized and the refugees. In Italy alone, more than 500,000 people live underground in inofficial camps.

What an irony, that Matera, the European Capital of Culture and „Jerusalem“ of world cinema is surrounded by refugee camps. Where would the contradictions of modern Europe be more visible than here and what would make more sense than shooting a political Jesus movie in this incredibly beautiful and poor region, mixing biblical iconography and real revolt?” – Milo Rau

THE NEW GOSPEL

WITH YVAN SAGNET, PAPA LATYR FAYE, SAMUEL JACOBS, YUSSIF BAMBA, JEREMIAH AKHERE OGBEIDE, MBAYE NDAYE, KADIR ALHAJI NASIR, ALI SOUMAILA, VITO CASTORO, MARIE ANTOINETTE EYANGO, ANTHONY NWACHUKWU, MOHAMMED SOULEIMAN, ALEXANDER KWAKU MARFO AND MANY OTHERS

AND MARCELLO FONTE, ENRIQUE IRAZOQUI, MAIA MORGENSTERN

CONCEIVED, WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY MILO RAU

PRODUCERS ARNE BIRKENSTOCK, OLIVIER ZOBRIST, SEBASTIAN LEMKE

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY THOMAS EIRICH-SCHNEIDER

DRAMATURGY & EDITING KATJA DRINGENBERG

DRAMATURGY & CONCEPT EVA-MARIA BERTSCHY

DRAMATURGY & ASSISTANT DIRECTOR GIACOMO BISORDI

SOUND MARCO TEUFEN

WITH THE VOICE AND THE SONGS OF VINICIO CAPOSSELA

SET DESIGN & COSTUMES ANTON LUKAS

A production of Fruitmarket, Langfilm & IIPM – International Institute of Political Murder in coproduction with SRF Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen / SRG SSR, ZDF in cooperation with ARTE, in collaboration with Fondazione Matera Basilicata 2019, Consorzio Teatri Uniti di Basilicata and Teatro di Roma. Additionally supported by Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, BAK Bundesamt für Kultur, Zürcher Filmstiftung, DFFF – Deutscher Filmförderfonds, Kanton St.Gallen Kulturförderung / Swisslos, BKM – Die Beauftragte der Bundesregierung fur Kultur und Medien, Volkart Stiftung, Suissimage Kulturfonds

Milo Rau, born 1977 in Bern, is the artistic director of the Vienna Festival (Wiener Festwochen) | Free Republic of Vienna. Critics call him the “most influential” (Die Zeit), “most interesting” (De Standaard), “most controversial” (La Repubblica), “most scandalous” (New York Times) or “most ambitious” (The Guardian) artist of our time. The director and author, who is known for his work at the interface of art and activism, has published over 50 plays, films, books and actions. His theatre productions have been shown at all major international festivals, including the Berlin Theatertreffen, the Festival d’Avignon, the Venice Biennale, the Vienna Festival and the Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels, and have been touring in over 30 countries worldwide. From 2018 to 2024 Milo Rau was Artistic Director of NTGent (Belgium). Milo Rau has received many awards, including the 3sat Prize 2017, the Saarbrücken Poetics Lectureship for Drama 2017 and, as the youngest artist after Frank Castorf and Pina Bausch, the renowned ITI Prize of the World Theatre Day in 2016. In 2017, Milo Rau was voted Director of the Year in a survey conducted by Deutsche Bühne, in 2018, he received the European Theater Prize for his work and in 2019 he was the first artist ever to be appointed Associated Artist of the European Association of Theatre and Performance – EASTAP. In 2020 he received the renowned Münster Poetry Lectureship for his complete artistic oeuvre. His plays were voted “Best of the Year” in critics’ surveys in over 10 countries. In 2019 he received an honorary doctorate from Lund University in Sweden, in 2020 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Ghent University. A star honours him on the ‘Sibiu Walk of Fame’ (2023) and the Bitef Festival honoured him with the Politika Award for Best Director in 2024. 

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