Die Pfeffermühle
('The pepper mill')
Erika and Klaus Mann's
political cabaret
The reading's texts and scenes celebrate the legendary cabaret ensemble 'Die Pfeffermühle', which Erika and Klaus Mann, the actress Therese Giehse and the pianist Magnus Henning founded in Munich in 1933. Their new 'literary cabaret' countered intolerance, racism and violence with satire, irony and linguistic precision. Only a few weeks after its successful debut performance, the group was forced to flee to Switzerland to escape the Nazis and continued its work in Zurich. Between 1933 and 1936, the ensemble performed over one thousand times – in Bern, Basel, Amsterdam, Prague and Brussels.
In 1935, Erika Mann lost her German citizenship due to her participation in Die Pfeffermühle. In 1937, the cabaret ensemble emigrated to the USA in consequence of the increasing political pressure, but failed to continue its success there and subsequently split up. The Pfeffermühle's texts reflect the era's abysses, the exile, being afraid of censure and their firm belief in the ethical power of words.
With wit and bite, Die Pfeffermühle exposed the Third Reich's language patterns and myths. Their pieces are early evidence of a mindset that viewed thinking, writing and performing as an act of civil resistance. On the eve of the 20 July 1944 commemorations, Caroline Peters and Martin Brambach ensure that this important voice of resistance – urgent, precise and full of an intellectual courage that is still exemplary to this day – can be heard once again.
Caroline Peters is not only a member of the company of the Burgtheater in Vienna, but also at home on the great stages of the German-speaking countries. She has played the Paramour in Jedermann at the Salzburg Festival. Her role as the inspector in the TV crime series Homicide Hills made her a star; at the cinema, she starred in the successful comedies How About Adolf?, Family Affairs, Weddings and Wokes: A Family Dilemma and, most recently, The Intangible Joy of Love. She has won the Grimme-Preis television award and Austria's Nestroy theatre prize and has twice been voted Actress of the Year. She published her celebrated debut novel Ein anderes Leben ('Another life') in the autumn of 2024.
After many long runs at the Burgtheater and other important theatres, Martin Brambach is now famous as one of the most versatile German film actors, thanks to over 150 roles. On television, he plays Inspector Schnabel in the Dresden-based episodes of the long-running TV crime series Tatort, for example, a portrayal that has earned him a Grimme-Preis television award, and he has also appeared in such successful productions as the adaptations of Schirach's Shades of Guilt and Thomas Vinterberg's The Command.
