The Deutsches Theater has withheld municipal salary bonuses that it had to pay to its employees and, according to its own statements, used it to plug financial holes in the operating company. Well over 130,000 euros for the Munich allowance and the job ticket did not end up with the employees as prescribed, but in the empty box office of the theater, which wanted to avoid bankruptcy during the corona pandemic. This was confirmed by the cultural department and the management of Süddeutsche Zeitung. However, there are apparently irregularities not only with the money, but also with the accounting of the employees’ working hours. In three cases there was a complaint by the trade inspectorate, the management confirmed. No punishment was pronounced.
The Deutsches Theater is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the city, but as a house with many guest performances it has a different character than the Kammerspiele and Volkstheater, which are also municipal. According to the statutes of the operating company, it is intended to be used primarily for performances in the area of ”operettas, musicals, popular theater and modern shows”. After it was extensively renovated from 2008 to 2013 and reopened in 2014, productions such as “We Will Rock You”, “Elisabeth” and “Chicago” were shown there. According to the city, it had more than 300,000 visitors a year. The theater hall has a capacity of 1500 seats, in addition there is the “silver hall” with 230 seats.
But these remained largely empty during the pandemic due to the long closings. The two managing directors Carmen Bayer and Werner Steer cite the lockdown of the cultural scene as the reason why the city’s grants have not yet reached any employees. Deutsche Theater Betriebs GmbH has been at risk of bankruptcy since March 2020 due to the lack of income, they write in a statement. It was no longer possible to draw up a business plan that could be approved.
The city “cushioned” the loss of income with a special fund
But the city cushioned the unfortunate situation in 2020 with “a special fund of 1.5 million euros,” they explain themselves further. Nevertheless, the theater society is still in a difficult situation. “The topic of allowances has therefore been postponed so far because it was initially about measures to secure a living, for example also by applying for short-time work benefits.” On the basis of which resolutions, possibly by the supervisory board or the shareholder, they would have acted, there was no answer.
The situation was made known through two anonymous e-mails. The first was received in the office of Mayor Katrin Habenschaden (Greens), the head of the German theater’s supervisory board. After the presentation of their spokesman, this was also processed and answered immediately. However, the return mail received an error message, the address may not have been active, said the spokesman. A few days after the email to Habenschaden, another anonymous message was received in the office of the Third Mayor Verena Dietl (SPD), which is formally not responsible. Dietl’s spokeswoman said that she asked Habenschaden to address the issue on the supervisory board.
Since 2020, the monthly allowance has been 268 euros
“I found out at the end of October 2021 that the Deutsches Theater hadn’t paid the allowances,” said Habenschaden. As a result, in mid-November on the supervisory board, she “asked the management (…) to pay the allowances retrospectively to all employees”. The theater, which has its headquarters at Schwanthalerstraße 13, and the cultural department are currently examining how this could be done. How many employees could benefit from this, the unit and management did not provide any information. “That will be checked in coordination with the supervisory board,” declared the managing directors.
According to the cultural department, the Deutsche Theater Betriebsgesellschaft is currently being funded by its mother, the City of Munich, with an annual grant of 1.9 million euros. “This includes 130,000 euros for the Munich allowance and the granting of the job ticket,” said a spokeswoman. Since 1990 the city has been paying its employees with lower and middle incomes a Munich allowance. Until 2019 it amounted to 134 euros per month, from 2020 the city doubled the allowance to 268 euros. In addition, the city council decided in spring 2020 to pay the Munich allowance and the job ticket to the employees of the wholly owned subsidiaries.
A second incident that causes considerable unrest in the Deutsches Theater are investigations by the trade inspectorate, which is part of the government of Upper Bavaria. A government spokesman explains that they are “following up on a possible violation of the Working Hours Act”. Since the proceedings are ongoing, no further information can be given at the moment. The supervisory board boss Habenschaden says she hadn’t known anything about it so far, “but I asked the cultural department to investigate this information and to report back promptly.”
There is no works council in the Deutsches Theater
According to an employee of the theater, who contacted the SZ, it should be about weekly working hours of 70 to 80 hours and non-granted compensatory days. When the theater was restarted with an elaborate new production, it was – since employees were sick at the same time – “work peaks came up”, the management explained about the processes in general.
The current events in the Deutsches Theater also raise the question of whether a works council has taken care of the concerns of the employees. The answer is: No, there is no works council in the Deutsches Theater. A situation that, according to the will of the supervisory board boss Habenschaden, should change quickly: “If the employees want to set up a works council, I would expressly welcome this and support this concern.”