Director Barrie Kosky plunges us into a nightmarish, wildly exaggerated satire, with marching noses, rolling rickshaw tables, and caricatured protagonists in garish costumes that straddle folklore and historicism, all unfolding within a cold, bleak setting that feels claustrophobic despite its size. This surrealist story of the insecure and paranoid upstart Platon Kuzmich Kovalyov is transformed into a absurd, kaleidoscopic revue of the vanities, an unsettling collision of Wozzeck and Alice in Wonderland with its own ‘irrational’ logic.

The Nose

Schiller Theater

Engelbert Humperdinck’s celebrated fairy-tale opera for the whole family has returned to the stage of the Komische Oper Berlin! In this new production by Dagmar Manzel, the story of the siblings lost in the forest burgeons with fresh new life, full of childlike imagination, poetic wit, and plenty of magic.

Hansel and Gretel

Long before Oscar Wilde’s interpretation, the figure of Salome already appeared in the Bible. There, the story was about how King Herod, his stepdaughter Salome, and John the Baptist (Jochanaan) each lose their heads—although in very different ways...

Sa­lo­me

Imagine being immortal and witnessing four centuries of history firsthand—first as a man, then as a woman...

Günter Papendell

Events

Upcoming events

Feb 21 - May 15, 2026

Hansel and Gretel · Komische Oper Berlin

May 16 - Jun 6, 2026

Orlando · Komische Oper Berlin

Past events

Mar 15 - Apr 6, 2026

The Nose · Komische Oper Berlin

Feb 21 - May 15, 2026

Hansel and Gretel · Komische Oper Berlin

Future and recently performed repertoire

Peter, Broomstick in Hansel and Gretel by Humperdinck

Komische Oper Berlin

Platon Kusmitsch Kowaljow in The Nose by Shostakovich

Komische Oper Berlin

To Jochana in Salome by Strauss

Komische Oper Berlin

Shelmerdine/Greene in Orlando by Neuwirth

Komische Oper Berlin

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