Proof, David Auburn’s Pulitzer Prize winning play, now being presented by the Nora Theatre Company at the Central Square Theatre in Cambridge, MA, is in theory about the world of mathematics. However, presumably influenced by Auburn’s lack of knowledge of the topic, this four-hander explores family problems and clichés about mathematicians rather than mathematics. …
Au théâtre de la Colline:
Dieudonné Niangouna rend hommage à son maître, Sony
Labou Tansi, en adaptant l’une de ses pièces les plus célèbres,
Antoine m’a vendu son destin, et en y mêlant ses propres
textes. Un condensé de l’Afrique en un temps record, 1h30, il y
a longtemps que Dieudonné Niangouna n’avait pas présenté un
spectacle aussi resserré.Dieudonné Niangouna a 9 ans lorsque
Sony Labou Tansi et Daniel Mesguish répètent Antoine m’a vendu son destin à Brazzaville. Il observe les répétitions du spectacle
qui sera créé en 1986 au Festival International des Francophonies de Limoges …
Reviewed by Natasha Lomonossoff
Ex Machina’s production of Robert Lepage’s recent play 887, showing at the National Arts Centre’s Babs Asper theatre, is a true triumph in innovative storytelling. The technologies of video and image projection work to complement the events and interactions that are recounted onstage in a way that is meaningful rather than cheesy. The program for the show states that “Ex Machina’s creative team believes that the performing arts-dance, opera, music-should be mixed with recorded arts-filmmaking, video art and multimedia.” Upon seeing a performance of 887, one is inclined to agree. …
Spiro Veloudos, the producing artistic director of Boston’s Lyric Stage, has long admired the work of the prolific composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim. During his twenty years at the Lyric, he has directed at least eight of Sondheim’s musicals. Veloudos’ latest, Road Show, which he co-directed with choreographer Ilyse Robbins has a somewhat checkered past.
ArtsEmerson is dedicated to bringing compelling and experimental theatre from all parts of the world to Boston. On January 10, Manual Cinema, a company that devises works that cross the line between cinema and theatre brought Ada/Ava to ArtsEmerson’s Paramount Theatre. First produced in 2013, Ada/Ava is the second full-length production by this young Chicago collective of five. Since then they have added three more productions and become known in the US and abroad. …
Yana Meerzon, from the University of Ottawa, attended the event.
The 16th ceremony of the Europe Theatre Prize and the Europe Prize Theatrical Realities took place from December 12 to 17, 2017, in Rome. The event included presentations of the artists’ work, public discussions, round-tables and selected productions.
Janine Bailly paru dans Madinin-art.net, Martinique
La performance NO43 de la compagnie estonienne Tallinn est une forme de théâtre inédite, troublante au point de générer chez certains un indicible malaise. Que l’on apprécie ou non, on ne sort pas indemne de ce spectacle, tant il distille une impression de violence, physique et mentale, tant il illustre la vilénie de l’être humain, son individualisme forcené, la brutalité de ses instincts et des rapports qu’il entretient avec ses semblables. « Toute la souillure et le mal dont l’homme est capable, en neuf personnages », dit un critique. …
Doing it right!
Yael Ronen, an Israeli theatre director working for the Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin, has a reputation of one of the most socially, culturally and politically aware theatre artist of Europe. The Gorki’s latest creation – Roma Armee that premiered in Berlin in September 2017 – is a proof in point. Devised by the international team of eight performers, all ethnic Roma, this production speaks directly to the most dangerous tendencies in the post-Brexit Europe: such as rising nationalism, xenophobia and racism. …
A Production of the Munich Kammerspiele winner of XIV Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, 2017
Inspired by the 1993 novel The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides and the 1999 film adaptation by Sofia Coppola, Susanne Kennedy’s production looks at the difficult issue of teenage suicide that has become a curse of today’s society. An exploration of the impossible journey through a near-death experience, the production is structured after the Tibetan Book of the Dead. It follows the death voyage of the now deceased 13 year old girl, Cecilia, from the highly religious Lisbon family in the US. …
A production from Tallin, Estonia: the winner of XIV Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, 2017.
The end of the world has come, there is nowhere to go, we are trapped in our uselessness and muddy reality of being… that is the message that Theatre N099 and its performance No 43 – Filth want to convey. The statement is not new, the passion it carries is not surprising, the methods it uses are curious.
The collective “we” the company uses – both in its promotional material and on stage – is recognizable but bothering. Do we really come from mud and die in it? Are we all the soul-less golems with no faith or fear left? Is there any hope left? The Estonian directors Tiit Ojasoo and Ene-Liis Semper seem to have no positive answer. …