Karl Hellweg is standing trial. He has been charged under Section 175, the law that was tightened by the Nazis and continued to be enforced in its National Socialist form long after the end of the war. Karl is no stranger to the justice system. His name has appeared in official files for decades – on a list that never disappeared: the so-called Pink List..

During the trial, Karl’s world of memories unfolds: it takes us back to the 1920s, to a formative first friendship and the moment when Karl realises that he is different; then on to Berlin in the early 1930s – a city that promises freedom, offers a sense of belonging and allows for a life beyond social norms – and finally to the abrupt end of this world following the Nazis’ rise to power.

The memories shift to the concentration camps of Sachsenhausen and Flossenbürg: forced labour, violence, humiliation; the fragile struggle to survive within a system that systematically strips gay men of their rights and seeks to eradicate them. Even after liberation in 1945, Karl’s persecution does not end. The newly founded Federal Republic of Germany does not recognise him as a victim. The old files remain. So do the old laws.

Moving between the courtroom and Karl’s memories, the piece creates a portrait of a man who refuses to disappear. THE PINK LIST tells of the persistence of state-sanctioned injustice, the long shadow cast by Section 175, and the struggle for recognition in a society that would rather suppress its responsibility. The play is inspired by historical events as well as surviving testimonies and life stories of gay concentration camp survivors.

A solo musical driven by songs that move between anger, loss, and hope. Not a story of heroism, but the testimony of a life that endures in spite of everything.