Angela Richter


Angela Richter is a German-Croatian theatre director and author.

Life and work

From 1996 to 2001 Richter was a member of the Hamburg art group with the artists Jonathan Meese, Abel Auer, Roberto Ohrt, Helena Huneke, :de:Birgit Megerle|Birgit Megerle and Andre Butzer. At the same time Richter studied directing with Jürgen Flimm at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater Hamburg, graduating in 2001. Her work - which encompasses aspects of fine art, theatre, and performance - has been described in the German-language press as gonzo-theater, with reference to the work of Hunter S. Thompson.
In 2006 she founded the Fleetstreet theatre in Hamburg, which she ran until 2010. From 2013 to 2016 she was one of the four house directors at the Cologne National Theatre Schauspiel Köln. She received the 2009 :de:Theaterpreis Hamburg – Rolf Mares|Rolf Mares Theatre Award for her staging of Der Fall Esra, based on the legal case that resulted in the ban on the author Maxim Biller's novel :de:Esra |Esra.
Richter's staging of Antigone, the first play by Slavoj Žižek, is set to premiere in September 2019 at the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb.

Work on Internet Activism

Richter has often made work with and about Internet activists such as Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. In 2012 her play Assassinate Assange premiered in Hamburg, and was subsequently shown in Berlin, Cologne and Vienna. Since then Richter has visited Assange regularly in London and has taken part in many panel discussions on the subject of his imprisonment, as well as contributing articles and interviews to various publications, including Der Spiegel, :de:Monopol |Monopol, and Interview.
In 2015 Richter wrote and directed the interactive multimedia project Supernerds, which dealt with digital mass surveillance, whistleblowing and digital dissidents. Supernerds was co-produced by the national television and radio channel WDR, Schauspiel Köln, and the producers :de:Christian Beetz |Gebrueder Beetz, and included an online gaming component. The premiere of the piece took place simultaneously on german television, radio, online, and in the theatre in Cologne. The audiences of each show became part of the story, being subjected to examples of hacking and surveillance on their smartphones and laptops. The piece was based on interviews that Richter conducted with whistleblowers, human rights lawyers, hackers, and internet activists such as Julian Assange, Daniel Ellsberg, the NSA Whistleblowers Bill Binney, Thomas Drake, and Jesselyn Radack. As part of the project, and also subsequently, Richter visited Edward Snowden in Moscow.
From 2015 to 2017 Richter hosted an irregular series of conversations with Internet activists at Berlin's Volksbühne during Frank Castorf's last two seasons as artistic director.
Richter is a member of the DiEM25 Advisory Panel.

Writing

A selection of Richter's interviews with Internet activists was published in the book Supernerds - Conversations with Heroes by :de:Alexander Verlag Berlin|Alexander Verlag Berlin in German and English. In 2018 she co-authored Women, Whistleblowing, Wikileaks together with Sarah Harrison and :es:Renata Ávila Pinto|Renata Ávila. She writes regularly for the German newspaper Der Freitag.

Personal life

Richter lives between Berlin and Dubrovnik with the German actor :de:Malte Sundermann|Malte Sundermann, their two children, and her son from her marriage to the painter Daniel Richter. Richter is of Croatian descent.

Productions (selected)