My Other Life

With the question "What name would my parents have given me if I had been a boy/girl?" Mats Staub invited visitors and staff at a festival to take part in My Other Life. Everyone could have their say, but only one word: their other name. Everyone was asked to say this single word to the camera and then silently imagine what their life would now be like, if they were Franziska instead of Matthias, Giovanni instead of Giovanna, Heza instead of Abdullah.

Many participants needed to contact their parents before the recording to find out what this name would have been–though it was also possible to take part if the name could not be known or none had ever existed. For the recording, the participants would be alone with cameraman Benno Seidel in a black box that was set up at a central location on the festival site; he filmed 200 people a day for four days. He and Mats Staub then arranged all the recordings of these other names in alphabetical order and condensed them into a 40-minute film. No voices can be heard–as soon as someone says a name, it appears beside their face in written form (or as a question mark, if it is not known, or as a dash if there was none). A connecting soundtrack is provided by music composed specially for this work by Andrea Brunner.

Viewers of the film see a fascinating series of contemplative faces whose interpreted gender does not match the name that appears next to them. Some of them laugh, some look dubious, others frown. One senses what great possibilities and lost opportunities are being imagined within them. The film was first screened at the festival just two days after the last recording, so the audience for the premiere was almost identical with the participants. One often sees the same faces several times during a festival but does not usually enter a conversation.

“Heide Merk, former Deputy Prime Minister of Lower Saxony would have been a Peter, Die Sterne’s singer Frank Spilker an Andrea and Martine Dennewald, Theaterformen’s Artistic Director, Marc. They and 206 other members of the festival’s audience, staff and artists were asked by Mats Staub to think about what would have happened if they had been born a different gender. The video recordings that were made during the first few days of the festival in a darkened room in the foyer have been edited down into a silent masterpiece: My Other Life. Each of them says their other name, the one they would have been given if they had not come into the world as the boy or girl they were. People are seen contemplating. Some of them laugh, others look rather dubious, yet more are thinking–about missed opportunities or those they took? Who knows? A woman called Laszlo takes a deep breath, a short, curly-haired woman called Philipp giggles a lot. There’s also a man called Chantale: he doesn’t look happy. What if? This is something you ask yourself watching this 45 minute long film. Watching others you start to see your own life–this fundamental principle of theatre is realized here so gently, so persuasively and so touchingly in visual form that it reaches deep into your soul. Wonderful.”
Neue Presse, 09.07.2015

“The material Mats Staub works with is memory. His work has already been seen on several occasions at Theaterformen. But none of his projects were ever as reduced, as wordless as one. The art of possibility he presents here is one that is both irritating and touching (…). It is one moment in which someone is utterly absorbed in themselves, where one can see someone thinking about themselves and their life and wondering whether it could have been different.”
Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung, 09.07.2015

Initiative, Concept, Direction: Mats Staub
Camera: Benno Seidel
Music: Andrea Brunner
Design: Krispin Heé
Production Manager: Klaas Werner, Elisabeth Schack
Producer: zwischen_produktionen
Co-producer: Festival Belluard Bollwerk International, Festival Theaterformen, Short Theatre Festival Rome, European Forum Alpbach, Conde Duque Madrid