 | Stefan Kaegi / Rimini Protokoll (D, CH)
Radio Muezzin
Tickets | 42% theatre
41% reality
17% call for prayer
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Their life is usually anything but glamorous, they live far away from their families, and often they are not much more than the caretakers of their little mosque; in addition to calling the faithful to prayer, their job also often involves hoovering and changing light bulbs. While they are a central part of Islam, the muezzins’ everyday life is frugal.
Some thirty thousand muezzins try to out-call each other six times a day in Cairo alone – often relying more on volume than on virtuosity. But things are set to change: The Egyptian minister for religious affairs wants to introduce a centralised muezzin next year. Thirty selected callers will be broadcast simultaneously to all mosques by radio – thousands of muezzins will fall silent.
After Indian call centre employees, unemployed air traffic controllers, funeral speakers and Bulgarian long-distance lorry drivers, Rimini Protokoll, known for their documentary theatre, that always puts “real people” and their own stories on stage, now focuses on the people who never feature in the heated political debates on Islam: a blind Qur’an teacher who has a two-hour minibus drive to the mosque every day; an Upper Egyptian farmer’s son and former tank driver who hoovers the carpet in his mosque every day; an electrician who started learning the Qur’an by heart after a serious accident, and a bodybuilder and runner-up world champion in Qur’an recital whose tapes are extremely popular among taxi drivers. They are the protagonists in a reconstruction of their own life, self-exponents of a religious culture whose many faces are often reduced to simple negative stereotypes in Europe.
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Stefan Kaegi also participates at Randnotizen (Marginal Notes) 2009
Accompanying "Radio Muezzin" and in the frame of the Sundaybrunch a screening of the documentary "Muezzin" by Sebastian Brameshuber, followed by a talk with the film maker, will take place.
Stefan Kaegi / Rimini Protokoll (D, CH) 
Produced by HAU (Berlin) & Goethe-Institut Egypt
Co-produced by steirischer herbst, Athens Festival, Bonlieu Scène nationale Annecy, Festival d’Avignon & Zürcher Theater Spektakel
Funded by German Federal Cultural Foundation, Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia & the Department of the Mayor of Berlin – Senate Chancellery – Cultural Affairs
In co-operation with El Sawy Culturewheel (Cairo)
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Austrian Première
Fri 25/09, Sat 26/09 & Sun 27/09, 7.30 pm
Festival centre
75’
In Arabic with German &
English supertitles
Talk following the first performance
22 EUR / 12 EUR
Festival centre
With Abdelmoty Abdelsamia Ali Hindawy, Hussein Gouda Hussein Bdawy, Mansour Abdelsalam Mansour Namous, Mohamed Ali Mahmoud Farag & Sayed Abdellatif Mohamed Hammad
Concept & Direction Stefan Kaegi
Composition & Sound design Mahmoud Refat
Video design Bruno Deville
Dramaturgy Laila Soliman
Set design Mohamed Shoukry
Light design Sven Nichterlein
Assistance direction / Performer Dia’Deen Helmy Hamed
Videooperator Bodo Gottschalk
Productionmanagment Juliane Männel
Tour attendance Samah Samir, Ghada El-Sherbiny, Ramy Tawfeeq
Translation and Supertitels Ebtihal Shedid, Bassant Hassan
Production Graz Dominik Jutz
Assistance Christian Sundl
Technical direction Hermann Schapek & Michael Doubek
Artists support Driss Tabalitz
Austrian Première
Fri 25/09, Sat 26/09 & Sun 27/09, 7.30 pm
Festival centre
75’
In Arabic with German &
English supertitles
Talk following the first performance
22 EUR / 12 EUR
Festival centreWith Abdelmoty Abdelsamia Ali Hindawy, Hussein Gouda Hussein Bdawy, Mansour Abdelsalam Mansour Namous, Mohamed Ali Mahmoud Farag & Sayed Abdellatif Mohamed Hammad
Concept & Direction Stefan Kaegi
Composition & Sound design Mahmoud Refat
Video design Bruno Deville
Dramaturgy Laila Soliman
Set design Mohamed Shoukry
Light design Sven Nichterlein
Assistance direction / Performer Dia’Deen Helmy Hamed
Videooperator Bodo Gottschalk
Productionmanagment Juliane Männel
Tour attendance Samah Samir, Ghada El-Sherbiny, Ramy Tawfeeq
Translation and Supertitels Ebtihal Shedid, Bassant Hassan
Production Graz Dominik Jutz
Assistance Christian Sundl
Technical direction Hermann Schapek & Michael Doubek
Artists support Driss Tabalitz
