JÖRG FOTH’S FILM Letztes aus der DaDaeR consists of a collection of cabaret pieces satirizing the final days of the GDR and the period shortly after the fall of the Wall. Foth’s film follows two clowns, played by the poet and songwriting duo Steffen Mensching and Hans-Eckardt Wenzel, as they travel the East German countryside giving performances and subsequently witness widespread rebellion. The following interviews reveal two very different views of the film and its place in the East German cinematic tradition. Axel Geiß’s Filmspiegel interview of September 1990 with Thomas Wilkening, “Erneute Ausgrenzung,” discusses the film in terms of its participation in the discourses of Trauerarbeit (the work of mourning) and Vergangenheitsbewältigung (coming to terms with the past) in a failed socialist system. In their Neues Deutschland interview of October 1990, director Jörg Foth and dramaturge Angelika Nguyen explicitly reference the film as an attempt to create something new for post-Wende audiences and to further the artistic tradition of Mensching, Wenzel, and celebrated GDR author Christoph Hein.

Aside from their discussions of the film with regard to the future of East German cinema in the post-Wende era, these interviews also provide salient background information about DEFA Babelsberg’s “Da-Da-eR” working group and its aesthetic program. Axel Geiß’s discussion with Wilkening, in particular, illuminates the struggle of filmmakers and collaborative filmmaking teams to reconceptualize projects for audiences since the fall of the Wall. Furthermore, Wilkening discusses the future of financial support for young filmmakers in the soon-to-be-unified Germany.

Axel Geiß

Renewed Marginalization. A Conversation with Thomas Wilkening,

Director of the Artistic Group Da-Da-R of DEFA Babelsberg

First published as “Erneute Ausgrenzung: Im Gespräch mit Thomas

Wilkening, Leiter der Künstlerischen Gruppe DaDaeR der DEFA

Babelsberg” in Filmspiegel 22 (1990): 23.

Translated by Tracy N. Graves.

The artistic group Da-Da-R that originated from the Nachwuchsgruppe [junior talent] of the DEFA Film Studio has existed since January 1, 1990. Will the group still be around to celebrate its first birthday? The way things stand at the moment, all the artistic staff in our studio will be let go on January. Including all those younger directors, camera operators, dramaturges, and production managers that form our group. We are fighting for the right to implement and finish our projects in new ways within the framework of the new structures.