The German director and acting director will take over from Kay Voges for the 2025/26 season
Vienna (OTS) – As the Volkstheater Private Foundation, chaired by Prof. DI Roland Geyer, announced today that the 42-year-old will become an actor and opera director Jan Philipp Gloger new artistic director of the Volkstheater Vienna from the 2025/26 season. He will succeed Kay Voges as the 17th director of the traditional Viennese house. After five years as artistic director of the Volkstheater, Voges will be moving to the Schauspiel Köln as artistic director in September 2025. Jan Philipp Gloger’s contract runs until 2030.
“I want to make sensual and stirring theater for a broad population, in the sense of a popular theater that enables participation, but can also be aggressive, and that sets complexity and differentiation against populist simplification and appropriation.
I would like to shape the house together with artists of my generation such as the director Rieke Süßkow or the theater musician Kostia Rapoport and bring the ensemble into the center as a bearer of approachability. One of several program focuses will be ‘drama and music’, also in the sense of a joyful border crossing between language and sound, meaning and madness, which is definitely based on Viennese traditions.
By the way, I’m really looking forward to coming to Vienna! I have a soft spot for Austrian literature, which I have been able to explore in productions by Schnitzler, Horváth, Handke, Köck and again and again Jelinek. I’m also incredibly attracted to the city that I’ve been visiting regularly for many years. The fact that my productions at the Volksoper and the Burgtheater are well received increases my anticipation for the Viennese audience.”
So said the designated artistic director of the Volkstheater, Jan Philipp Gloger, in an initial statement.
“Jan Philipp Gloger is the optimal future director of the Volkstheater, according to the unanimous opinion of the search committee,” shares the foundation board Roland Geyer with. “He is internationally successful as a director and he represents modern leadership and management skills. For him, the heart of the house is an unmistakable ensemble that finds contact with the audience and creates solidarity through direct and constantly new encounters. His vision of opening the theater even more to a heterogeneous and young audience, of becoming more broadly effective and approachable, is forward-looking and with his comprehensive understanding of dramatic and theatrical artistic expressions, I am convinced that he will be very successful in his project.”
“Jan Philipp Gloger is a man who lives theater with every fiber of his body and who was convincing across the board in the application process. Mr. Gloger presented himself as a thoughtful and team-oriented leader. He is a connector and enabler. Mr. Gloger is fully aware that the Viennese Volkstheater does not function without Vienna, that it needs very clear points of connection to the city, to the country, to Austrian literature and drama. And there are very, very many of them in his concept,” said Art and Culture State Secretary Andrea Mayer. “I trust him to fill this house to capacity – with enjoyable but at the same time artistically demanding theater.”
“As the new director, Jan Philipp Gloger will continue with his personal signature the impressive development of the Volkstheater under Kay Voges, which was also well noticed abroad and led to the successful development of new audiences. Gloger brings great experience, an excellent concept, outstanding artistic ability and a special connection to Austrian drama and literature to Vienna. He has already shown in Germany that he is able to position a house with bold settings prominently in a multi-voiced theater landscape. I see the fact that we have once again gained a directing director for the Volkstheater as a great stroke of luck for the city. I would also like to thank the search committee for their extraordinary commitment,” said City Councilor for Culture Veronica Kaup-Hasler.
Jan Philipp Gloger, born in Hagen in 1981, is a German actor and opera director. He studied applied theater studies with Heiner Goebbels at the University of Giessen and directing at the Zurich University of the Arts.
He has been directing plays since 2007. He worked at the Residenztheater in Munich, the Schaubühne Berlin, the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, the Schauspielhaus Hamburg and the Vienna Burgtheater, among others. He was responsible for many premieres and first performances.
Since 2010, opera and operetta productions have also been staged at major European theaters – for example in Amsterdam, Zurich, London (Covent Garden), Dresden and Vienna (Volksoper) as well as at the Bayreuth Festival.
From 2011 to 2013, Jan Philipp Gloger was senior director at the Mainz State Theater. Since the 2018/19 season he has been acting director at the Nuremberg State Theater, which was invited to the Theatertreffen in Berlin for the first time during his direction and is involved with productions by well-known directors (René Pollesch, Anne Lenk, Dieter Dorn, etc.), sensational outdoor projects and the founding a meeting place for artists, audiences and the scene as well as a digital venue and was able to connect it closely with the city. Both before and after the pandemic, the Nuremberg State Theater achieved very good visitor and occupancy figures.
Gloger’s productions, which also include cross-disciplinary projects, have been seen at festivals such as the Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen, the Autor*innentheatertage Berlin and the Festival for German Theater in Prague. They received numerous awards such as the Audience Award from the Mülheim Theater Days, the Operetta Frog of the Year and a nomination for the London Olivier Award.
All applicants had applied to succeed Kay Voges 47 individuals and teams received. The proportion of women was around 50%. 11 applications came from Austria, the rest from neighboring German-speaking countries. For the purpose of selecting the most suitable candidate, a five-member search committee was set up by the Volkstheater-Privatstiftung. Two members of the search committee were appointed by the federal government and the city of Vienna, the fifth person comes from the board of the Volkstheater-Privatstiftung, namely: Prof. DI Roland Geyer (chairman of the foundation board and the search committee), Mag.a Theresia Niedermüller (BMKÖS), Mag.a Eva Kohout (City of Vienna), Andreas Beck (Intendant at the Bavarian State Theater/Residency Theater) and Rita Thiele (chief dramaturg and deputy director at the Schauspielhaus Hamburg until 2021). The search committee acted without instructions, independently and without outside influence and made a recommendation to the foundation board based on personal hearings. The final decision on the new appointment was made by the board of the Volkstheater-Privatstiftung.
Further information can be found at Folk Theater | Online press center.
Questions & Contact:
Volkstheater Ges.mbH
Patricia Büchele
Press & Public Relations
patrizia buechele@volkstheater.at