This article examines a noticeable shift in German theatre toward works, forms of staging, and formats that programmatically avoid the label ‚fictional‘. It takes up the question of why and in what form and with what consequences a turn toward ‚post-fictional‘ theatre can be explored. Although its genealogy stretches back at least to the 1920s, if not to latenineteenth century naturalism, the article focuses on two examples: a work of documentary theatre, Heinar Kipphardt’s „In der Sache Robert J. Oppenheimer“ (1964) and a production by the performance group, Rimini Protokoll, “Adolf Hitler Mein Kampf, Band 1 und 2.” We propose that postfictional theatre is not an interruption of the fictional but it in fact establishes an entirely new frame that privileges new forms of aesthetic experience; in fact it may even redefine theatrical aesthetics by de-emphasizing affect, narrative and metaphor in favour of metonymy and direct engagement with topics of everyday life.