Kids in the Spotlight

The documentary film KIDS IN THE SPOTLIGHT follows five children of the youth ensemble at Friedrichstadt-Palast Berlin, witnessing the exciting process from casting, through rehearsals, to the grand premiere in front of 2.000 viewers on the largest theater stage of the world.

Year

2019

Length

92 min

Director

Alice Agneskirchner

For the eleven year old Nick a long time dream is fulfilled when he passes the casting successfully. Non-conformist Luna (10) is passionate for ballet and soccer alike; Alex (16) casts one of the lead parts and is about to spread her wings while shy Maya (9) still has to gain self-confidence and find her place on stage and in life. Quite unlike Oscar, the YouTuber called ‘Ossi Glossy’ on the web: with his 500.000 subscribers the teenager is a star already – and is about to be torn between YouTube, school and the rehearsals every day.

KIDS IN THE SPOTLIGHT is a coming of age story that reveals much of the joy and pain that comes along with transcending from child- into adulthood. However, accompanying the children throughout their very first dancing classes and reading exercises, singing lessons, dress rehearsals, and all choreographic trainings the film also offers a behind the scenes look into the one and only professional children’s theater ensemble in Germany and the great effort of creating a kids revue of superlative scale.

The Friedrichstadt-Palast in Berlin houses the largest show stage worldwide and with 250 children runs the biggest kids and youth-company in Europe. What is especially remarkable is that all lead and minor parts are casted by children and that there is only live singing in all shows. Each year during the pre-Christmas season more than 50 shows are organized and presented to almost 2.000 viewers each time.

Credits

Directed by
Alice Agneskirchner

Director of Photography
Marcus Winterbauer

Editor
André Nier

Sound
Karsten Höfer & Thomas Funk

2nd Director of Photography
Jakob Stark

Music
Benjamin Schlez & Berend Intelmann

Creative Producer
Georg Tschurtschenthaler & Zora Nessl

Produced by
Christian Beetz

Production Manager
Anique Roelfsema

Line Producer
Kathrin Isberner

Commissioning Editors
Rolf Bergmann (rbb)  & Anke Sperl (rbb)

Sales & distribution

Trailer

„Just in diesem Moment überraschen uns die aus dem Theaterbereich stammenden jungen Regisseure Hans Block und Moritz Riesewieck mit einem erstaunlichen Dokumentarfilm, der seit Monaten Publikum und Kritik auf den wichtigsten Festivals der Welt elektrisiert. Völlig zu Recht: Es ist, als würden einem die Scheuklappen weggerissen, als sähe man das, was sich seit Jahren direkt vor unseren Augen abspielt, zum ersten Mal unverschleiert... eine fesselnde ,Doku noir' mit höchstem Anspruch...Dieser Film müsste an allen Schulen gezeigt werden.“

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

17.05.2018