Two dancers, three actors and the text of French absurdist writer Eugène Ionesco are the starting point for The Bald Soprano.
Noord Nederlands Toneel + Club Guy & Roni
Two couples come together for dinner, but soon everything that should be normal loses its meaning in a bizarre game of language and movement. In the small living room the characters look for a place in a rapidly changing world, a world that they have not really understood for a long time. But no matter what happens, they keep trying to come together.
Post-truth world
In 2016 director Liliane Brakema conducted a successful theatrical investigation into this piece. The result was shown only to a small audience in Groningen. Because in a post-truth world – in which nothing and therefore everything is true – the piece is so highly topical, the NNT asked Brakema to turn it into a full-fledged production for a national tour.
Liliane Brakema
With her physical directing style, Brakema already stood out during her directing training, she is the first director ever to be selected with a graduation performance for the prestigious Dutch Theatre Festival as one of the ten best performances of the 2016 season. This was the starting signal for an international career, among others at the Noord Nederlands Toneel, NTGent and Schauspielhaus Bochum. In October 2020 Brakema made her debut with ‘Uncle Vanya’ in the main stage. The reactions were laudatory:
“brutal direction, cast-iron whole” NRC ⭐⭐⭐⭐
“wonderfully unorthodox” Trouw ⭐⭐⭐⭐
“successful, daring, quirky” Dagblad van het Noorden ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Credits
Director – Liliane Brakema
Writer – Eugène Ionesco
Dramaturg – Florian Hellwig
Assistant Director – Ludy Graffelman
Composer – Helge Slikker
Costumes – Helga Richter and Ilona Overweg
Lighting design – Vinny Jones
Set design – Liliane Brakema and Ilona Overweg
Production manager – Niran Straub
Subtitles – Martijn Boot
Technic – Tom Vollebregt; Theunis Zijlstra
Sound – Peter Zwart
Light – Jeroen Loois
