Imploding Fictions' Blog » OIT

Review of ‘Angstmacher’ in the Wiener Zeitung

Øystein — Mon, 10 May 2010 12:09:35 +0000

Von Lona Chernel

Sieben Frauen und ein Mann betreten im Lauf des Abends die kleine Bühne im Theater Drachengasse, Raum Bar & Co. Sie präsentierten das Finale des Nachwuchs-Theater-Wettbewerbs, Thema “Die Angstmacher”. Die meisten von ihnen sind schauspielerisch sehr gut ausgebildet, haben auch schon an großen Bühnen Erfahrungen gesammelt.

Die fünf Kurzstücke sind unterschiedlich, nähern sich dem Thema von verschiedenen Seiten. Das reizvollste ist wohl “Flap an Fear”, in dem zwei aufgeschreckte Täubchen (herrlich komödiantisch Rowena Hutson und Lauren McCullum), da sie der deutschen Sprache nicht mächtig sind, das Lied vom “Tauberln vergiften” gründlich missverstehen. “Flaneur of Fear” (darstellerisch facettenreiches Trio: Elisa Seydel, Franziska Hackl, Cora Jeannee) relativiert geschickt den Begriff des Bösen. Als sperrig erweist sich “Bang! Bang! Ein Manifest” und bedarf der hervorragenden Interpretin Susanna Kellermayr, um zu voller Wirkung zu kommen.

Allzu einfach macht es sich der begabte Eugen Fulterer mit “Baracks Wurscht-fisch”, eine Gratwanderung ist Anne Frütels “Einbau”.

79 Projektvorschläge waren eingelangt, 70 Prozent aus Österreich, die übrigen 30 Prozent aus 15 weiteren Ländern. Man muss der Jugend eine Chance geben, dann zeigt sie, wie viel Kraft, Mut und Talent sie hat.

English translation:

In the course of the evening, seven women and one man take to the small stage at Theater Drachengasse’s bar & co. They are the finalists of the theatre’s newcomer competition with the theme „Fearmongers“. Most of them have trained at prestigious schools and gained experience at big theatres.

The five short pieces are very different, and approach the theme from alternate angles. The most engaging is Flap and Fear in which two alarmed pigeons (in wonderfully comic portrayals by Rowena Hutson and Lauren McCullum) thoroughly misunderstand the song of poisoning pigeons due to linguistic differences. Flaneur of fear (a trio with a wide range: Elisa Seydel, Franziska Hackl, Cora Jeannee) artfully relativizes the concept of evil. ‘Bang! Bang! a Manifesto’ turns out to be quite clunky and needs Suzanne Kellermeyer’s considerable acting skills to bring it to life.

Eugen Fulterer’s Baracks Wurscht-fisch is too simplistic and Anne Frütel’s Einbau is a balancing act.

79 young artists applied for this scheme, 70% from Austria the other 30% from 15 different countries. The evening shows that if you give young artists a chance they show how much energy, courage and talent they have.

Here Be Monsters

Øystein — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 21:42:39 +0000

For sailors, adventurers and those fools who loved to face their fears, cartographers would write on maps of unknown regions the legend ‘Here Be Monsters’.

Helpful information? Or did they just worship the mysterious, the unknown and the notorious?

I hadn’t worked in the theatre for a long time, when two years ago I decided enough was enough and took off towards my own unknown. I quit my office job, packed a change of clothes into a rucksack, left my phone and I-pod on the kitchen table and got on a plane leaving England for France.

From France I walked all the way across Spain, to finish on the west coast where the land meets the sea. It took me forty days and forty nights (and if that isn’t true, it should be.)

At the sea I had a choice – to return to my office job, spend all my time there each day, buy a sandwich at lunch, be allowed one tea break in the morning, one in the afternoon.

Or I could choose to spend as much time as possible doing what I love – writing plays. I hadn’t been involved in making theatre for three years. I looked at the map. ‘Here be monsters’ it said.

Scary as it was, I made the choice to return to a career writing plays. I stepped into unknown territory seeking liberation, with a smile on my face and an optimism bordering on insanity. Let there be monsters I thought. Let there be fear.

At the Drachengasse Theatre in Vienna, starting on May 3^rd, will be the play I wrote for the directors of Imploding Fictions. It is called ‘Flap and Fear’.

It involves Lilly and Jesse, two pigeons who go on holiday to Vienna.

You know the way pigeons gather in the park? Then if you move close to them, they flap their wings in fright and fly away? What happens next?

They always come back.

Pigeons returning to the crust of bread in the park and me returning to pursue a career in playwrighting are the same thing. They are stories about the addiction we have to our fears. The compulsion, the obsession to test, sample, discover how close we can get to the fire before we burn our hand.

‘Here Be Monsters’ the map says.

Curious, we keep going to have a look.

- Darren Lerigo, april 2010

***

Guest-blogger Darren Lerigo is a Madrid-based playwright and theatremaker. He has written Imploding Fictions’ latest play “Flap and fear” which will be performed as part of the Newcomer-scheme at Theater Drachengasse in Vienna 3rd – 22nd May 2010.

From Toy Story to Communism

Øystein — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 19:47:53 +0000

– Wallace Shawn and The Fever

Wallace Shawn (Photo: Unknown)

Acting in Hollywood blockbusters for kids and overt Marxist politics don’t generally go hand in hand. So it’s probably fair to say that amongst contemporary playwrights Wallace Shawn wins the award for quirkiest CV. He’s a comedian, writer, political activist, translator of Brecht, essayist and social commentator with degrees in history and economics from Oxford and Harvard. Amongst the many facets of his artistic career however, personally he sees himself first and foremost as a playwright. It’s a lovely paradox that while his theatre work is often dark and confrontational and has caused outrage, he is loved by millions as the voice of Rex in Toy Story.

Wallace Shawn (Photo: Unknown)

Despite one critic describing him as ‘one of the worst and unsightliest actors in this city’ his appearance in The Princess Bride turned him into a cult figure and ever since he’s been plying his trade as the Hollywood oddball. On the other end of the spectrum he’s also appeared in the semi-autobiographical dialogue My Dinner with Andre, and a deconstruction of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya titled Vanya on 42nd Street, both directed by the legendary Louis Malle. Shawn’s theatre work began in 1978 with the play Marie and Bruce and he polarised critics and audiences from the start. His play A Thought in Three Parts caused a minor uproar in London in 1977 when the production was investigated by a vice squad and attacked in Parliament due to allegedly pornographic content. Shawn was back in London last year, this time treating viewers of his new play Grasses of a thousand colours to graphic descriptions of sex with cats. This time no legal action was taken! His language is both lyrical and violent and his themes often overtly political. Shawn is a master of drawing parallels between the psychology of his characters and the behaviour of governments and social classes and this culminated in his work The Fever.

Wallace Shawn (Photo: Unknown)

The Fever follows a nameless character’s journey as he awakens on a bathroom floor in a nameless poverty-stricken country. Sick and alone, this everyman recounts the story of how he has arrived at this particular hotel, and the painful realisations that has accompanied his journey. It’s a journey that brings him face to face

with the grotesque inequalities at the heart of modern existence. Shawn asks us to look at the choices we make, on a daily level, to see how we are each continuing the flow of keeping the poor in the poverty zone and the rich in the insulated levels of power. His wealth, he realises, depends on others’ poverty, his comfort on

others’ deprivation. He comes to see that his life is ‘irredeemably corrupt’. Shawn then continues to depict the torturous reasoning of a mind trying to find its way back to acceptance of a state of affairs it has discovered to be morally untenable. He eventually shifts from spasms of disgust for his part in the world’s injustices to

coolly logical arguments for maintaining the status quo. Wallace Shawn deconstructs the contradictions and compromises of the urban liberal mind with wit and rigour. The play asks us if we should feel guilty once we realise that our hard work does not justify our comfort, when in reality all work hard but not all are comfortable? And what steps should we take when that realisation is made?

Wallace Shawn (Photo: Unknown)

The Fever has been described by Shawn as his ‘most autobiographical work’. He has been working on it constantly for many years and the work and its form have undergone many permutations. Shawn originally intended it as a piece of political activism rather than ‘a play’. In the 80s he performed it himself at dinner parties in peoples living rooms all around New York. He says he would ideally perform it after his audience had tucked into a nice meal and still had a glass of champagne in their hands. He would proceed to tease away at the things that underpin the lifestyles

of middle-class liberals. The central conflict would unfold directly between the play and the audience. In 1990 The Fever became a stage play and was performed in both New York and at London’s Royal Court Theatre. Most recently, in 2004, Shawn turned The Fever into a tv show for HBO starring Vannessa Redgrave and Michael Moore. The Fever remains a powerful and probing assault on the distribution of wealth in our society and our privileged existence. OIT are proud to be presenting the play for the first time in Oslo.

The Fever by Wallace Shawn (US)

a rehearsed reading by Oslo International Theatre

at Vardeteatret in Oslo, Radhusgt. 19

22nd April at 7pm

Directed by Øystein Ulsberg Brager

Performed by Torgny G. Aanderaa

Production management: Teatersirkus / Michael H. Sciarrone

The reading will be performed in english.

Tickets: 70,- NOK

To reserve tickets email oslointernasjonaleteater@gmail.com

For more information on OIT see:

http://oslointernasjonaleteater.wordpress.com

Oslo International Theater is a project run by Imploding Fictions.

The Fever was first performed by the author January 1990 in an apartment near Seventh Avenue in New York City.

Performed with kind permission by Casarotto Ramsay & Associates.

Imploding Fictions attempts Crimp in Oslo

Øystein — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 22:44:05 +0000

Oslo International Theatre presents the Norwegian premiere of

Attempts on Her Life

by Martin Crimp

a rehearsed reading at Vardeteatret in Oslo

Translated by: Katharina Gellein Viken

Directed by: Øystein Ulsberg Brager

With: Katharina Gellein Viken, Christoffer Hag Maure, Robert Rustad Amundsen og Torgny G. Aanderaa

Produced by: Michael H. Sciarrone

Thursday 11th March at 7pm at Vardeteatret, Rådhusgt. 19 in Oslo, Norway

Tickets can be reservered via oslointernasjonaleteater@gmail.com

Attempts on Her Life is a modern masterpiece by British dramatist Martin Crimp.

When it burst onto stage in 1997 at London’s Royal Court theatre it created both immense excitement and considerable bafflement. It’s the work of a freewheeling imagination in which seventeen scenarios collide to create the portrait of a highly ambiguous character called ‘Anne’. With each scenario we are presented with a different facet of her enigma. Is she a porn star, an international terrorist, a victim of aliens, a physicist or indeed a make of car? Martin Crimp presents us with all these options in this virtuosic tour de force of a play which is by turns funny, shocking, entertaining and sad. More than a decade after its’ premiere Attempts on Her Life has become an established modern classic and a major influence on young writers the world over. OIT is proud to present the first reading of this extraordinary piece in Norway in a brand new translation by Katharina Gellein Viken.

Welcome to Attempts on Her Life!

Philip Thorne

Joint artistic director of Imploding Fictions and dramaturg for Oslo International Teater

About Crimp and Attempts on Her Life:

The most radically interrogative play in western mainstream theatre since Beckett.

Mary Luckhurst

The piece has a kaleidoscopic vigour … It is driven by a radical contempt for the new global capitalism and its attempt to turn us all into peripatetic, depersonalised consumers … He may have dispensed with plot and characters, but he has proved that the act of theatre can still survive if it is propelled by moral fervour.

Michael Billington, Guardian

This is what the brave new theatre of the 21st Century will look like – both on stage and on the page.

Nicholas de Jongh

[Crimp] has an extraordinary fastidiousness about language … He displays the formal bravura of one who delights in his craft.

Independent on Sunday (om Crimps The Country)

Martin Crimp is one of the hottest properties in Europe.

Guardian

For more information on OIT see:

http://oslointernasjonaleteater.wordpress.com

Oslo International Theatre is a project run by Imploding Fictions:

www.implodingfictions.com

Attempts on her Life by Martin Crimp was first presented by the English Stage Company at the Royal Court Theatre.

Publisher: Nordiska ApS

Photo from OITs reading of Seven Other Children by Richard Stirling. From the left: Sveinung Oppegaard and Torgny G. Aanderaa. Copyright: Michael H. Sciarrone

- Oystein