Theater Baden-Baden

The Theater Baden-Baden is a neo-Baroque theatre building erected in 1862 in the style of the Paris Opera. Its roughly 250 events each year draw around 45,000 visitors. The theatre stands on Goetheplatz in Baden-Baden’s Kulturmeile.

History

In 1810 a new spa theatre was inaugurated near what is today the Kurhaus (spa house). This building, made largely of wood, had to give way just ten years later to the new Conversationshaus. In the right wing of this Conversationshaus, today’s Kurhaus, Friedrich Weinbrenner set up a theatre hall. Between 1853 and 1855 the casino concessionaire Edouard Bénazet remodelled this wing into lavish gaming rooms, so a new venue once again had to be found for the theatre. The decision was made to erect a new building on Goetheplatz. Under Bénazet’s influence the French architect Charles Dérechy was commissioned to design the theatre. The Baden building authority under Heinrich Hübsch, however, resisted the French stylistic diktat. When Dérechy died in 1859 while the project was still in the planning phase, the work was handed to the local architect Ludwig Lang. He too failed, and so the architect Charles Couteau ultimately built the new theatre. On 8 August 1862 the new theatre was ceremonially opened with the opera ‘Béatrice und Bénédict’, composed for the occasion by the French composer Hector Berlioz. In 1869 Jacques Offenbach conducted the premiere of his operetta La princesse de Trébizonde at the house.

With the ban on gambling in 1872 the theatre’s programme also changed. German ensembles, above all the Karlsruhe Court Theatre, shaped the programme of the spa town.

The year 1918 was especially significant for the theatre. After today’s Bénazetsaal had been fitted out in the Kurhaus as a large stage hall, the wish arose for the town to have its own theatre ensemble. In 1918 the time had come, and a 40-member ensemble began its work under the artistic director Hans Waag.

After the Second World War the French occupying power fostered cultural life in Baden-Baden, and so the theatre resumed operations as early as 20 April 1946.

From 1989 to 1992 the theatre was extensively renovated. The main auditorium and all other rooms were renewed and the house was equipped with modern stage technology.^[1] The main auditorium today seats around 500. The ensemble also performs at smaller venues, including the Spiegelfoyer and the Theater im Kulissenhaus.

From 2004 Nicola May led the theatre. In a good two decades as artistic director she established, among other things, its own youth theatre division, the inclusive drama club “Club inclusive” and the Abitur project “Fit fürs Abi”. At the end of the 2025/26 season she is stepping down from the directorship at her own request. She will be succeeded for the 2026/27 season by the dramaturg and author Simon Meienreis, who previously worked at the Maxim Gorki Theatre in Berlin.^[2]

The change comes at a time of tight budgets. According to the outgoing artistic director, a renovation backlog running into the millions has built up on the building over the years, and the transition to the new directorship comes with spending cuts and a smaller ensemble.^[3]

Sources

• Manfred Söhner Baden-Baden. Kunst und Kultur entlang der Oos Aquensis Verlag Baden-Baden 2007, ISBN 978-3-937978-10-9, pp. 44 ff.
• Helmuth Bischoff Baden-Baden. Die romantische Bäderstadt im Tal der Oos DuMont Buchverlag Köln 1996, ISBN 3-7701-3086-3, pp. 123 ff.

References

1. ↑ Theater Baden-Baden – Der Theatersaal (Archived)
2. ↑ Simon Meienreis wird Intendant in Baden-Baden, nachtkritik.de, 2025
3. ↑ Sparzwang und Aufbruch: Wie der künftige Intendant das Theater Baden-Baden neu erfinden will, Badische Neueste Nachrichten, 9 December 2025 (Archived)