About the work
Männerphantasien was created at Deutsches Theater Berlin on the basis of Klaus Theweleit's influential study of the same name, supplemented by newly commissioned texts by Svenja Viola Bungarten, Ivana Sokola and Gerhild Steinbuch. The production premiered on 1 December 2023. Theweleit's two-volume study from the 1970s provides its literary and theoretical basis.
Plot
The production investigates contemporary forms of authoritarian and fascistic masculinity. Theweleit's analysis of the soldierly male body provides the starting point. The new texts move the inquiry into different present-day environments: Gerhild Steinbuch writes from the perspective of the mother of a perpetrator of sexual violence, Ivana Sokola develops an exhausted male chorus searching for belonging, and Svenja Viola Bungarten addresses right-wing internet culture through an influencer narrating her transformation from a feminist into a tradwife.
Cultural significance
The work brings a major text of German fascism, gender and body theory into dialogue with contemporary politics and digital culture. The production was invited to the Radikal jung festival in 2024 and received considerable critical attention. Its distinctive achievement lies in treating Theweleit's study not simply as material for adaptation but as an argument to be actively extended through newly written dramatic perspectives.