World Voices: MARIUS VON MAYENBURG (Germany)

Join us for a World Voices reading of ELLEN B. by one of Germany's most celebrated playwrights MARIUS VON MAYENBURG. In a new translation by Daniel Brunet, directed by WHITNEY WHITE. With New York actors SAMANTA SOULE (Astrid) from Queen's Gambit , HAN VAN SCIVER (Klara) from At the Wedding, CHRIS STACK (Wolfram) from Stereophonic. Followed by a talk with Mayenburg, Jonathan Green (Steppenwolf) and Frank Hentschker and a reception.

About the play:

ELLEN B. is a taut psychological thriller about power, desire, and shattered certainties. When Astrid, a teacher, invites her boss home for an informal evening, a troubling allegation surfaces: something happened between Astrid and one of her students — Ellen Babić. As past and present collide, the principal starts to question the nature Astrid's relationship with her younger partner Klara, while Astrid is starting to expose patriarchal structures at work. And the question of what really happened proves impossible to answer.

The English-Language premiere of ELLEN B. will be produced at Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago, IL, April 1 - May 9, 2027.

Directed by Whitney White.

Marius von Mayenburg (Germany) is a playwright, director and translator. Born in Munich, he studied playwriting at the Academy of the Arts, Berlin. He was a dramaturg and writer in residence at the Schaubühne Berlin. His plays (such as THE UGLY ONE, FIREFACE, A PIECE OF PLASTIC,) are translated into more than 30 languages, have been successfully produced worldwide at the Schaubühne Berlin, the Young Vic, London, National Theatre Oslo,  the Royal Court Theatre, Théâtre national de la Colline in Paris , La Scala, Paris among many others and have won several awards. As a translator he has translated works by William Shakespeare  and Oscar Wilde, as well as contemporary plays by writers such as Martin Crimp, Alan Ayckbourn and Sarah Kane into German.

His most recent trilogy consists of the plays EX, ELLEN BABIĆ and EGAL, which have all been premiered internationally at theaters such as Rikstheatre in Stockholm, Sweden, the National Theater of Reykjavik, the Burgtheater Vienna.

As a director, Marius von Mayenburg has worked at the Schaubühne Berlin, Residenztheater in Munich, Schauspiel Frankfurt, Riksteater Stockholm, Nationaltheater Oslo among others.

Image of Marius von Mayenburg © Kristina Popov

Whitney White is a Tony Award nominee, Obie Award and Lily Award-winning director, writer and performer. Broadway: Liberation, Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, The Last Five Years. Other: All Is But Fantasy (Royal Shakespeare Company), Walden (Second Stage), Jordan’s (The Public), Saturday Church (NYTW), The Secret Life of Bees (The Almeida, UK), The Spectacularly Lamentable Trial of Miz Martha Washington (Steppenwolf), Soft (MCC), On Sugarland (New York Theatre Workshop, Lucille Lortel and Drama Desk nominations, Outstanding Direction), Semblance (NYTW), The Amen Corner (Shakespeare Theatre Company), Our Dear Dead Drug Lord (WP Theater, Second Stage), What to Send Up When It Goes Down (The Movement Theatre Company, Woolly Mammoth, A.R.T., The Public Theater). Staff writer: I’m a Virgo (Amazon Studios). Writer/performer of Macbeth in Stride (A.R.T., Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Musical Performance by an Actress). Recipient of the Herb Alpert Award, Jerome Fellowship, Susan Stroman Directing Award. Part of the Rolex Protegé and Mentorship Arts Initiative. MFA Acting: Brown University/Trinity Rep, BA: Northwestern University. Whitney-White.com

Jonathan L. Green is the Director of New Play Development for Steppenwolf where his most recent dramaturgy credits include Suzan-Lori Parks’s The Book of Grace, Sam Shepard’s Fool for Love, and both the world premiere and Broadway transfer of Branden Jacobs-Jenkins's Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning play Purpose. Previously Green was the Director of New Works for Goodman Theatre, where his dramaturgy credits included the world premieres of Christina Anderson’s How to Catch Creation, Rogelio Martinez’s Blind Date, Charles Smith’s Objects in the Mirror, and Doug Wright’s, Scott Frankel’s and Michael Korie’s War Paint, as well as works in development by Charise Castro Smith, Octavio Solis, Abe Koogler, Bess Wohl, Paola Lázaro, and Dave Harris. As a director, he has worked with Sideshow Theatre, Steppenwolf, Diversionary Theatre, TheatreWorks, Greenhouse Theater Center, Silk Road Rising, Playwrights’ Center, and more. Green served as the Artistic Director of Sideshow Theatre Company from 2007-2020. 

Special thanks to Antje Oegel, Berlin.