LIMINAL STATES BEFORE EXECUTION
based on a gap in Friedrich Schiller's «The Maid of Orleans»
DIRECTED BY: Marie Schleef
SCHIFFBAU BOX
WORLD PREMIERE: 19.09.2025
1 hour 35 minutes (no interval)
This is a true story from the 15th century. In the period spanning from May 1430 to May 1431, Joan of Arc, a figure of both renown and controversy, was held in prison as she awaited her execution. In his adaptation of the historical material, which was first performed in 1801, Friedrich Schiller notably omitted this year. This gap in the theatrical canon has prompted director Marie Schleef to trace the fate of women* condemned to death.
What if Joan were alive today? How much waiting time would Schiller have to cut from the biography of a modern-day Joan? According to Amnesty International, women* worldwide are disproportionately likely to end up on death row, where they face discrimination and unfair trials. However, most of these cases play out far from the public eye.
The play addresses this global disparity. The aesthetic power of theatre is used to reveal a condition that is usually concealed from public awareness. Marie Schleef’s directorial work brings to the stage in a formally innovative way what often remains in the dark. Her work, characterised by a feminist lens, examines the world through a magnifying glass, thereby creating new theatrical narrative forms.
For the opening of the Schiffbau Box, she and her team are inviting the audience to step into a closed cosmos, where they can viscerally experience and share the sensation of liminal existence – the state of limbo in a death cell.
In collaboration with Amnesty International Switzerland
SPECIAL: On 10 October 2025, World Day Against the Death Penalty, a panel discussion will take place after the performance. DER TOD IST KEIN STRAFURTEIL
SENSORY WARNING: This production includes loud noises, some intense sound patterns, fog and some bright lights.
Panel afterwards
with Amnesty International Switzerland: DER TOD IST KEIN STRAFURTEIL 9.30 p.m.
