2025
THE YEARS
“To salvage something from a time that will never be again.” Annie Ernaux
Drawing on photographs and film footage, memories and notes, words, jokes, sayings and advertising slogans, melodies, fashion and furniture, smells and objects, Annie Ernaux evokes years gone by. In this way, she records her life – our life, life – in a completely innovative narrative form, a kind of collective autobiography.
She combines her own experiences with collective memory and the sum of her generation’s influences. Influences which, though radically subjective, are perhaps universal precisely for that reason. From her childhood in the post-war period, the shift in environment from a poor provincial town to the metropolitan intellectual middle class, through a struggle for emancipation and self-determination marked by setbacks, starting a family, the beginning of 1968, the advent of consumer society – political events, crises and transformations constantly intertwine with personal events – right up to the beginning of the 21st century. Annie Ernaux is not, however, someone who knows everything best. Within the grand context of social change, she remains a seeker. And she finds a way to make us aware of the passage of time as a polyphonic stream that carries us along.
Annie Ernaux, born in 1940, describes herself as an ‘ethnologist of herself’. She is one of the most important contemporary French-language writers, and her twenty novels have been acclaimed by both critics and the public. In 2022, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
“THE YEARS”
by Annie Ernaux / translated from French by Sonja Finck
DIRECTOR – Jette Steckel
SET DESIGN – Florian Lösche
COSTUMES – Pauline Hüners
CHOREOGRAPHY – Dominika Knapik
MUSIC – Anna Bauer
VIDEO – Zaza Rusadze
DRAMATURGY – Julia Lochte
Cast:
Barbara Nüsse
Maja Schöne
Cathérine Seifert
André Szymanski
Rosa Thormeyer
Sebastian Zimmler
Jirka Zett
and Anna Blomeier, Sandra Flubacher, Marina Galic, Bernd Grawert, Julian Greis, Lisa Hagmeister, Franziska Hartmann, Johannes Hegemann, Pascal Houdus, Nils Kahnwald, Maike Knirsch, Felix Knopp, Mirco Kreibich, Oliver Mallison, Björn Meyer, Thomas Niehaus, Tim Porath, Christiane von Poelnitz, Pauline Rénevier, Falk Rockstroh, Toini Ruhnke, Gabriela Maria Schmeide, Steffen Siegmund, Lisa-Maria Sommerfeld, Oda Thormeyer, Tilo Werner
LIVE MUSIC – Arne Bischoff (ensemble director), Laila Nysten, Timon Schempp, Johannes Wennrich
PREMIERE: 17 May 2025, THALIA THEATER, Hamburg
Photos: Armin Smailovic
Excerpts from reviews:
“This is the final premiere under the direction of Joachim Lux. And what a finale! A celebration of life, theatre, farewells and memories. This evening is filled with quiet melancholy. Memories, influence, change, maturity, transience – these are also themes explored in Annie Ernaux’s autobiography *The Years*, which director Jette Steckel has brought to the stage in a very astute adaptation co-written with chief dramaturg Julia Lochte.”
“The actors are frequently accompanied by the entire ensemble, which acts as a kind of moving chorus in beautiful group scenes choreographed by Dominika Knapik. This presence has its effect. Even if at times they simply sit quietly on stage.”
Irene Bazinger of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (21 May 2025) saw in Hamburg “a cheerful, coquettishly amusing dance troupe, energetically choreographed by Dominika Knapik – as if we were at a musical theatre!”.
“The moment when Maja Schöne lies in a hotel bed next to her husband, played in this scene by Sebastian Zimmler, who, however, instead of engaging in amorous play, immediately falls asleep and is carried off the revolving stage, is wonderful. There are many such funny, clever moments this evening. Cathérine Seifert shines with her dry humour, and André Szymanski with the carefree joy of his performance.”
“Die Jahre” [is] a great celebration of the moment, with the awareness that theatre is just as fleeting as life. Jette Steckel and her team have thus succeeded in creating a magnificent finale to this artistic director’s tenure.
“This evening is a celebration of memories, images, and the actors, who are fantastically accompanied by Arne Bischoff’s ensemble.”
“Steckel skilfully conjures up ‘Die Jahre’ on stage – with the musical ensemble and the main cast at the centre, joined by almost the entire company that has shaped the Thalia Theatre in recent years. Sometimes it is a family, sometimes society – to which the woman we are telling the story of here undoubtedly belongs. Outside and inside: Florian Lösche’s set design also takes up this perspective. Large, round, transparent walls can be opened and closed.”
“Theatre is a living artistic organism that creates its own experiences and memories. But its very essence is also transience. “Die Jahre” is therefore, on two levels, a melancholic exploration of fleeting moments. At the same time, the nearly two-and-a-half hours are a celebration of life and desire, of the body and of art.”
