Historical dictionary of German Theatre

BACHMANN, STEFAN

(1966- )
Director. Bachmann studied literature and worked at the Schauspielhaus in his native Zurich until 1988, when he began working as an assistant toLuc Bondyat the Schaubühne inBerlin. There, he completed studies in theater history and formed a student troupe, members of which later formed the Theater Affekt. Their productions, most notably ofHeinrich vonKleist'sPenthisilea, won the 1995 Friedrich Luft Award, while Bach-mann's productions in Kassel, inHamburg, and at the Berlin Volksbühne continued to attract wide critical praise. He became director the Theater Basel in 1998, and a year later critics in a poll taken byTheater Heutedesignated Theater Basel as "theater of the year."