by Ben Kernow
Presented by Ha Hum Ah Productions
The ropes are ready, the crowd is waiting and the hangman has a new apprentice. When Claus Kohler is apprenticed to Frantz Schmidt, Nuremberg’s seasoned executioner, the two men are thrown together in a world where duty, morality and power collide, and every decision leaves a mark. But as the gallows fill and suspicion takes root, their fates become dangerously entwined, until both must decide who they are and which side of the rope they stand on.
Performed by just two actors, Making a Killing is a razor-sharp, dark comedy about justice, corruption and the cost of survival in a world disturbingly like our own. Bold, biting and impossible to ignore, the play takes inspiration from The Journal of Master Franz Schmidt, Public Executioner of Nuremberg (1573–1617), a remarkable historical record that lays bare the humanity and contradictions of a man who killed for a living.
About Ha Hum Ah Productions
Ha Hum Ah is an award-winning Cornwall based theatre and film production company. We create innovative, ambitious and accessible stories that stimulate the imagination.
Ha Hum Ah Theatre was established in 2018 to offer the support and framework for artists to produce their own work with the aid and collaboration of others. Many artists don’t fulfil their artistic potential, due to the daunting prospects and challenges with producing and staging their own work. In response Ha Hum Ah Theatre was formed to act as a co-operative theatre company where actors, director, writers and creatives of all backgrounds could work together in realising and harnessing each other’s creativity. Through this process we believe we’ve tapped into a unique, exciting and vibrant way of creating theatre for artists and audiences alike.
In 2021 Ha Hum Ah expanded into the world of film with the creation of Ha Hum Ah Films, with the aim of bringing our unique and inventive style of telling stories to the world of motion pictures.
In 2023 the theatre and film arms combined to form Ha Hum Ah Productions CIC.