Christopher Williams Broadcasts His Adaptations of Franz Xaver Kroetz’s Inklusive on WKCR 89.9 FMMonday, October 5, 2026, 3pm
For the past several years, Christopher Williams has engaged with the work of Franz Xaver Kroetz. He has produced adaptations of Kroetz's theatrical works for radio broadcast and long-play vinyl, and edited and published several translations as books.
In the early 1970s, Kroetz was among the most frequently staged playwrights in Germany. Celebrated in some circles for creating unflinching portraits of working class life in Bavaria, theater critic Dominic Dromgoole also acknowledged that, to many, “he was the most mind-bogglingly boring playwright history had ever thrown up.”
In a social realist tradition, Kroetz’s radio play Inklusive follows a Bavarian couple on an all-inclusive Italian holiday. It premiered when Germany was divided, first broadcast in West Germany by Südwestfunk (Southwest German Radio) in 1972; a second version—with different actors performing altered dialogue—aired two years later in East Germany on Rundfunk der DDR (East German Radio). Picking up on the transmutations between versions, Williams recorded adaptations of both in 2023, utilizing vintage audio equipment from each state.
Williams’s recordings will air in their 81-minute, 30-second entirety on Monday, October 5, at 3pm, through a special presentation with WKCR 89.9 FM-NY.
This production is part of the 85th Anniversary Live Broadcast Series of WKCR 89.9 FM, the non-commercial educational and listener-funded radio station at Columbia University. Listeners can tune in at 89.9 FM or online at wkcr.org.
The cast and crew of Radio Play include Eva Mattes, Sebastian Bezzel, Norbert Stöß, Andreas Leupold, Rüdiger Carl, Mo Stern, Franz Xaver Kroetz, Christopher Williams, and Maximilian Klemens Sänger.
Radio Play is part of Christopher Williams’s exhibition Provisional Props and Blocking Templates, on view at Arts and the Letters through November 29. This exhibition is Williams’s contribution to The Game.
