1981 Bavarian Film Awards - Best Director, 1987 Kleist Prize
Thomas Brasch (19 February 1945 – 3 November 2001) was a German
author,
poet and
film director.
Life
Born in
Westow, Yorkshire, England, Thomas Brasch was the son of
German JewishCommunistémigré parents.[1] In 1947, the family returned to
East Germany.[2] Brasch attended school in
Cottbus.[2] From 1956 to 1960, he was at the National People's Army Cadet School and made his Abitur.[2] From 1964, he studied journalism in
Leipzig and was forced in 1965 to ex-matriculate.[2] Since 1966 he worked at the theater
Volksbühne Berlin,[2] and studied dramaturgy at the film school
Babelsberg afterwards. In 1968, he was relegated and sentenced to two years and three months in prison for "anti-state agitation", because of the protest against the invasion of
Czechoslovakia.[3][2] In 1971, after being a miller in a Berlin factory, he worked in the Brecht archive and was then freelance writer. In 1976, after protesting against
Wolf Biermann's expatriation, he moved to
West Germany.[2]
In May 2012, Brasch's play Lovely Rita was performed in English for the first time in the Warwick Arts Centre.[6]
US productions
In November 1976, Brasch's theatre piece Paper Tiger was performed in English for the first time at the 4th International Bertolt Brecht Conference in Austin, Texas,[7] with music composed by
Raymond Benson. Benson subsequently directed an off-off-Broadway production of the musical in New York, New York, in September 1980.[8]
"Wer durch mein Leben will, muß durch mein Zimmer", poetry, Frankfurt (Main) 2002
"Was ich mir wünsche", poetry, Frankfurt (Main) 2007
"Du einsamer, du schöner Wicht", audio book, read by Katharina Thalbach and Anna Thalbach, Hoffmann&Campe 2007
Filmography
1981 – Engel aus Eisen – Director and screenwriter (with
Hilmar Thate,
Katharina Thalbach, Peter Brombacher,
Klaus Pohl [
de], Ulrich Wesselmann and
Karin Baal). That was the first movie by Brasch. In 1981 he was awarded the
Bayerischer Filmpreis. His acceptance speech was controversial, since Brasch explicitly thanked the Filmhochschule der DDR for his education.