BERLIN — A German ballet director issued a public apology on Tuesday for smearing dog feces on the face of a newspaper critic whose reviews he had taken exception to.
Marco Goecke was suspended from his post as ballet chief at the Hannover state opera following the weekend incident. T he theater’s management called on him Monday to apologize “comprehensively” and explain himself.
According to the daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Goecke approached its dance critic, Wiebke Huester, during the interval of a premiere at the opera house on Saturday and asked what she was doing there.
The newspaper said that Goecke, who apparently felt provoked by a recent review she wrote of a production he staged in the Netherlands, threatened to ban her from the ballet and accused her of being responsible for people canceling season tickets in Hannover. He then pulled out a paper bag with the feces and smeared her face with the contents.
“I…
