About the work
“changes” is a play by the Berlin playwright and dramaturg Maja Zade, who has been writing her own texts for the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz since 2019. It premiered on 30 November 2024 in the Schaubühne’s Saal B, directed by Thomas Ostermeier. Anna Schudt and Jörg Hartmann played every part in that production, switching between around twenty characters with only a few props.
Plot
A Berlin couple who have been together for more than twenty years discuss the day ahead over breakfast: Nina is a member of parliament fighting to save a run-down women’s shelter, while Mark has given up his career as a corporate lawyer and now teaches at a primary school. During the day they go their separate ways and run into professional dilemmas, while private burdens such as Mark’s drinking problem and earlier miscarriages remain present. In the evening they meet again, changed.
Cultural significance
The play asks how far one can improve the world without wearing oneself out, and where compromise begins. At the premiere, critics mainly praised the two performers’ quick-change skills but largely found the text clichéd and shallow.