|
||
Hello, dear people! I’m writing this letter from my hotel room with a view of the Matadero, the legendary slaughterhouses of Madrid. Now a great art place. We are playing Billy’s Violence there for a week. I love places that change their history. Buildings that never thought they would one day house beauty. Theatre is always better than a calf in terror. Unfortunately, no more than 250 people a night. The audience here has not quite returned yet. In contrast to the Salzburger Festspiele, where we sold 1500 tickets every evening with Intolleranza 1960 and ended up with a waiting list. There too, we played in a stable, but one where horses had to dance and sing for the rich citizens. Now we danced and sang there for rich citizens. We had the strange good fortune of being able to work with many young people during the corona time. Young dancers between the ages of 19 and 23. Many of them spent their last years of dance training at home. Their contacts happened through social media. They were forced to cultivate their private space. It was the only thing left. After that, working on a large dance production with a lot of body contact is not an obvious thing to do. The confusion surrounding one’s own private space and the objectification of the dance body then leads to intense discussions that are not easy, as more opinions are formed than knowledge is gained. The tyranny of social media forces many performers to have an opinion about every movement, every action, and even a political justification. This does not always make the question of the ‘dancing’ body more interesting. The irresponsible madness in the arts, the elusive, incorrect, subversive is something that many have become afraid of. But Intolleranza 1960 became a special experience because of this. The language of the new era requires a lot of patience and modesty. In the morning, a short visit to Museo Reina Sophía. An exhibition by Ida Applebroog. Look at her work! She is now 97 and the work she has been making in recent years is of a rare sharpness and commitment. She combines her feminist activism and her aversion to patriarchy with an exceptional craft and a desperate emotionality that is rare. Living proof that age really doesn’t matter. A quote from one of her works: SHOULD I CALL A DR? IT’S AN ERECTION STUPID Humour! Not a coward’s weapon but a necessary evil? Or is humour also old-fashioned? I hope not. I resolve to do sixty push-ups every day instead of thirty. My mind has been rejuvenated this summer. Now it’s time for my body. It has to last another forty years. I can’t let go of the image of that calf in terror. I often miss the intensity of that in theatre. Terror as a motor of beauty: interesting in an old-fashioned way. See you soon, Jan | ||
 |
WHAT'S GOING ON? | ||
|
After a spring still plagued by corona, Needcompany managed to present no fewer than four world premieres: Billy’s Violence in Barcelona, l’Incoronazione di Poppea in Vienna, Intolleranza 1960 in Salzburg and the English version of Molly Bloom in Hanover. Now that the world is rediscovering freedom, Needcompany is looking forward to a spring with a packed calendar. Besides a world premiere, two Belgian premieres and five touring productions, we are throwing open the doors of MILL to Xenia, an XL version of EXPLO presenting work by Leyla Aydoslu, Willem Boel, Dirk Braeckman, Helen A Flanagan, Mehdi-Georges Lahlou, Simon Lenski, Maarten Seghers, Grace Tjang (Grace Ellen Barkey), George van Dam, Emma van der Put, Har van der Put, Oscar van der Put and Guy Woueté. |
|
MALAM / NIGHT | ||
|
Obsessed with the night and inspired by both her ancestors and the Javanese shadow puppet theatre Wayang, Grace Ellen Barkey, who was born in Surabaya in Indonesia, enters into a dialogue with darkness in her installation performance MALAM / NIGHT and searches for the representation of her memory. |
|
|
|
‘Every story in my family hides the entire colonial history and its wounds. It is striking that in colonial history women are used and then put aside, forgotten. That’s why I decided that for this project I will decolonize my name and use my grandmother’s name.’ (Grace Tjang). A play of movement, light, videos, drawings and an immersive sound composition by Rombout Willems. The world premiere will take place on 7 October in Berlin at ‘The Sun Machine Is Coming Down’, a festival of Berliner Festspiele where work by Tino Sehgal, Markus Selg, Ed Atkins and Cao Fei, among others, will be shown. MALAM / NIGHT will be on view for ten days at the Internationales Congress Centrum. The Belgian premiere will be in MILL on 31 October during Xenia, the EXPLO curated by Oscar van der Put and Victor Afung Lauwers. | ||
|
EXPLO: Xenia | ||
|
MILL throws open the doors with an XL version of EXPLO. Under the name Xenia –or the virtue of hospitality curators Oscar van der Put and Victor Afung Lauwers invite the public to discover the work of eleven artists spread over two floors. During three extended weekends between 15 and 31 October, there will be visual work on display by Leyla Aydoslu, Willem Boel, Dirk Braeckman, Helen A Flanagan, Mehdi-Georges Lahlou, Maarten Seghers, Emma van der Put, Har van der Put, Oscar van der Put and Guy Woueté. | |
|
During the opening weekend (15-17 October), George van Dam and Simon Lenski will present the premiere of Dichterliebe, their new performance. The second weekend (21-24 October) sees the premiere of video work by Emma van der Put based on her physical presence at The House of Our Fathers/Mothers of Inventions (MILL, 2020). The last weekend (28-31 October) is dedicated to the Belgian premiere of MALAM / NIGHT by Grace Tjang (Grace Ellen Barkey); three days firstly as an installation with on 31 October a durational performance as the closing piece of the EXPLO. More information and exact timings on our website.
| ||
|
BILLY'S VIOLENCE | ||
After a world premiere – acclaimed by the press and the public – at Teatre Nacional de Catalunya (Barcelona) and ditto passages in Madrid, Ribadavia and Gdańsk, it is time to bring Billy’s Violence home for the Belgian premiere. For two evenings on 29 and 30 October, the Kaaitheater in Brussels will be subjected to this violently affectionate reinterpretation of Shakespeare’s tragedies in a tight scenography that gives maximum space to the performers, the text and the music.
Fight or flight? Join us! |
|
PUBLICATIONS | ||
|
Billy’s Geweld, the text by writer-poet Victor Afung Lauwers which served as a basis for Billy’s Violence, is being published by Bebuquin. The book with its reinterpretation of Shakespeare’s tragedies will be presented on 29 October at the Kaaitheater where it will be for sale. It is Lauwers’ debut.
|
|
|
|
THE POWER (OF) THE FRAGILE | ||
After Mohamed Toukabri was forced to put the work on The Power (of) The Fragile – a duet between mother and son – on hold for a long time due to Covid-related travel problems, Maimouna Latifa Khamessi was finally able to reach Belgium in early September. The duo is currently rehearsing in MILL. This Needcompany co-production will finally premiere at Dansens Hus (Oslo) on 14, 15, 16 and 17 October, and then continue its tour at the Beursschouwburg (Brussels), Vooruit (Ghent), STUK (Leuven) and Les Rencontres à l’Échelle (Marseilles). | ||
| ||
|
ALL THE GOOD | ||
|
In August 2019, All the good by Jan Lauwers with live music by Maarten Seghers premiered at the Ruhrtriennale. The touring schedule of the fictional self-portrait of Jan Lauwers that links the lives of the Israeli elite soldier Elik Niv and the Lauwers family ran until well into 2020. And then came Covid. | |
|
More than a year and a half after the last performance at Rijeka 2020, the cast and crew of All the good are ready to bring the performance back to life. The ‘let’s-pick-it-up-where-we-left-tour’ starts on 22 and 23 October at Toneelhuis (Antwerp), then goes to Festival delle Colline (Turin) and concludes 2021 at La Halle aux Grains – Scène Nationale (Blois).
| ||
|
L’INCORONAZIONE DI POPPEA | ||
|
On 22 May 2021, Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea, directed by Jan Lauwers with musical direction by Pablo Heras-Casado, premiered at the Vienna Staatsoper. Due to the overwhelming success of the first series, the opera will be performed four more times in the legendary temple of culture this autumn. On 6, 9, 11 and 13 October, the top cast including Slávka Zámečníková (Poppea), Kate Lindsey (Nerone), Xavier Sabata (Ottone) and Sir Willard White (Seneca) as well as Needcompany performers Yonier Camilo Mejia and Sarah Lutz will reprise their roles in this sensual love story in which morality is lost and greed and lust for power are prominent. | ||
|
MOLLY BLOOM | ||
|
‘It is the role of my life’, Viviane De Muynck said before the world premiere of Molly Bloom in Madrid. A year later, everyone who has seen De Muynck at work as Leopold Bloom’s unfaithful wife can only confirm this statement. |
||
|
The performance based on the last chapter of James Joyce’s Ulysses – played by De Muynck in both English and French – can be seen no less than eight times at MC93 in Paris between 21 and 28 October. There is no end in sight yet, as the play will then move on to Aix-En-Provence, Pau, Villeneuve d’Ascq, Mulhouse and Ghent.
|
|
|
|
FOLKS & FOOLS | ||
The premiere of Folks & Fools by Lobke Leirens and Maxim Storms (a Needcompany co-production) has been postponed twice due to Covid. Their enigmatic brew full of medieval babble, cosmic roguishness and whipped-up bourgeoisie is now finally finding its way to the public. On 13 and 14 October at Nona Arts Centre (Mechelen). | ||
|
BRUEGEL | ||
Bruegel by Lisaboa Houbrechts, the kaleidoscopic portrait of Pieter Bruegel the Elder and the era in which he created ‘Dulle Griet’ (Mad Meg), is going on tour again! This Needcompany co-production can be seen this autumn in Leuven (26 October) and Montpellier (17 and 18 November). | ||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
ON TOUR | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
A long newsletter we would like to summarize in a list with tour dates until the end of the year. Needcompany is truly everywhere this autumn and not to be missed! |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
WALK OF FAME (SIBIU) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Jan Lauwers was honoured with a star on the walk of fame at the Sibiu International Theatre Festival in August. The organisation described Lauwers as ‘one of the most provocative personalities in European theatre, a pioneer in the connection between “acting” and “performing”, and a theatre-maker who for thirty years has moved both theatre-goers and critics time and time again’. Jan Lauwers is grateful for the recognition and the nice words of the organization and is looking forward to visiting his star in Romania soon. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
