Is everything in the theatre always fake? No. Born in Cologne, Frank Gesner trained as an actor at the Folkwang University of the Arts in Essen and then returned to his native city for his first full-time theatre engagement. This was followed by work in Dresden, Dortmund and Vienna, where he worked with Claudia Bauer, Ersan Mondtag and Volker Lösch, among others. He made his debut as a director in 2019 in Dortmund with “norway.today”. Dortmund’s jury of critics twice awarded him their prize for Best Actor. Now he is moving back to Cologne again. One thing the theatre doesn’t need is: self-praise.