Quoi/Maintenant

1-2 (c) Koen Broos

A production based on the plays ‘Sleep My Baby Sleep’ by Jon Fosse and ‘A Piece of Plastic’ by Marius von Mayenburg.

Jon Fosse (Haugesund, Norway, 1955) is one of Scandinavia’s most famous writers and most-performed dramatists. His plays are staged all over the world. ‘Sleep My Baby Sleep’ is a real gem. The play is representative of Fosse’s style and approach: fragmented dialogues in which the rhythm and the sound come before the meaning, pared down sentences with an underlying poetry and emotional tension which confine and destabilize the spectator and at the same time give him space and comfort.

‘A Piece of Plastic’ is the most recent play by Marius von Mayenburg (Munich, °1972), dramaturge and playwright-in-residence at the Berliner Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz since 1999. It was written as a comedy with the theatrical structure of conventional boulevard theatre, but then seriously unhinged boulevard theatre…

The main story line is straightforward enough: the overworked Ulrike and her husband Michael, a left-liberal, environmentally- and politically-aware couple, at least in theory, employ Jessica as a domestic help and to look after their son who is hitting puberty prematurely. Jessica’s presence affects the reality of this family on various levels. The ideals of tolerance and broadmindedness are undermined, good intentions prove to be futile attempts to deny underlying prejudices and the couple’s sterile reality is exposed. Then there is the conceptual artist Haulupa who like a gadfly tries to disrupt the family ideal. The result is a malicious comedy, which expertly challenges our views and opinions about family, art and society. With painful accuracy, Marius von Mayenburg takes us straight to the nub of our first-world dilemmas and problems…

“I understand so little. And as the years pass, I understand less and less. It is true. But the opposite is also true, that as the years pass I understand more and more. Yes, it is also true that as the years pass I understand a great deal, an almost frightening amount. As a matter of fact, I feel almost faint at how little I understand and almost frightened at how much I understand. How can it be that both things are true, that I simultaneously understand less and less and more and more? (Jon Fosse, ‘The Gnosis of Writing’)

STAN - Quoi/Maintenant - Frank Vercruyssen — (c) Koen Broos

1-3 (c) Koen Broos

“I always try to write about things that irritate me. I try to write about things I know about.”

Marius von Mayenburg

In French

text ‘Dors mon petit enfant’ by Jon Fosse translated by Terje Sinding and ‘Pièce en plastique’ by Marius von Mayenburg translated by Mathilde Sobottke

by and with Jolente De Keersmaeker, Damiaan De Schrijver, Els Dottermans and Frank Vercruyssen

lighting design Thomas Walgrave

costumes An D’Huys

production and technique STAN

“One of the staunch devotees of the Bastille Theatre, the Flemish theatre company tg STAN has returned with a ferocious comedy, a shooting gallery of upper-middle-class figures, under the enigmatic title of “Quoi/Maintenant” (What/Now). With no staging or any of the contrivances of the theatre – as is their custom, they focus everything on the actors’ craft.”

Rue du Théâtre, 25/01/2018

“Frequently funny, sometimes downright hilarious, the dramatic situations of this malleable play benefit from the assurance of tg STAN, who have the ability to make every line sound natural, and make the most carefully-worded script sound like improvisation. They also have the ability to navigate from an intensely comic register to a more dramatic gravity, and to expose the flaws of a family in which a profound malaise is brewing, concealed beneath a social veneer: a dramatic collapse waiting to happen. In spite of a few script hesitations which will be ironed out over time, the Flemish company proved that they are still among the leaders of the theatre scene.”

Vincent Bouquet, Sceneweb, 26/01/2018

“The actors in the tg STAN company are extremely funny; but with each burst of laughter, we wonder whether we shouldn’t be crying instead. This kind of guilty hesitation, which spreads throughout Quoi / Maintenant (Now What?), comes from the fact that in almost every case, the company puts its most faithful audience on the stage – namely, middle-class intellectuals. These rusty voices displayed on the stage, strong and at the same time stumbling, are in reality our own. We shouldn’t laugh along with tg STAN. We should fear them.”

Simon Gerard, Toute la culture, 26/01/2018

2021

october

Wed 13.10.21
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Thu 14.10.21
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Fri 15.10.21 20:00
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Sat 16.10.21 19:00
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Mon 18.10.21
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Tue 19.10.21
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Thu 21.10.21 20:30
Comédie S. N. Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand

Fri 22.10.21 20:30
Comédie S. N. Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand

Sat 23.10.21 17:00
Comédie S. N. Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand

Sun 24.10.21 15:00
Comédie S. N. Clermont-Ferrand
Clermont-Ferrand

november

Mon 01.11.21
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Tue 02.11.21 20:30
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Wed 03.11.21 19:15
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Thu 04.11.21 20:30
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Fri 05.11.21 20:30
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Sat 06.11.21 20:30
Théâtre les Tanneurs ASBL
Brussel

Tue 09.11.21 20:00
Théâtre Benno Besson
Yverdon-les-bains

Wed 10.11.21 20:00
Théâtre Benno Besson
Yverdon-les-bains

Fri 12.11.21
Théâtre du Bois de l'Aune
Aix-en-Provence

Sat 13.11.21
Théâtre du Bois de l'Aune
Aix-en-Provence

Fri 19.11.21 20:00
Théâtre Joliette Minoterie
Marseille

Sat 20.11.21 19:00
Théâtre Joliette Minoterie
Marseille

Mon 22.11.21
Théâtre de Nimes
Nîmes

Tue 23.11.21
Théâtre de Nimes
Nîmes

Wed 24.11.21
Théâtre de Nimes
Nîmes

Sat 27.11.21
Théâtre de la Mouche
Saint-Genis-Laval

Sun 28.11.21
Théâtre de la Mouche
Saint-Genis-Laval

2020

March

Tue 24.03.20 20:00
La Rose des Vents
Villeneuve-d'Ascq

Wed 25.03.20 20:00
La Rose des Vents
Villeneuve-d'Ascq

Sat 28.03.20 16:00
La Scène Watteau
Nogent-sur-Marne

Sun 29.03.20 16:00
La Scène Watteau
Nogent-sur-Marne

April

Sat 04.04.20 20:30
La Mouche
Saint-Genis-Laval

Sun 05.04.20 15:30
La Mouche
Saint-Genis-Laval

Tue 07.04.20 20:00
Théâtre Benno Besson
Yverdon-les-bains

Wed 08.04.20 20:00
Théâtre Benno Besson
Yverdon-les-bains

Fri 10.04.20 20:00
Théâtre de Vénissieux
Vénissieux

Tue 14.04.20 20:30
Le Moulin du Roc
Niort

Thu 16.04.20 20:00
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Fri 17.04.20 20:30
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Sat 18.04.20 20:30
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Wed 22.04.20 20:00
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Thu 23.04.20 20:00
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Fri 24.04.20 20:30
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

Sat 25.04.20 20:30
Théâtre Garonne
Toulouse

may

Tue 05.05.20 20:00
Théâtre de Nimes
Nîmes

Wed 06.05.20 19:00
Théâtre de Nimes
Nîmes

Thu 14.05.20 20:30
Bois de l’Aune
Aix-en-Provence

Fri 15.05.20 20:30
Bois de l’Aune
Aix-en-Provence

Tue 19.05.20 20:30
La Piscine
Châtenay-Malabry

Wed 20.05.20 20:00
La Piscine
Châtenay-Malabry

2018

January

Thu 11.01.18 19:00
Théâtre Saint-Gervais
Genève

Fri 12.01.18 20:30
Théâtre Saint-Gervais
Genève

Sat 13.01.18 19:00
Théâtre Saint-Gervais
Genève

Tue 23.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Wed 24.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Thu 25.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Fri 26.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Sat 27.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Mon 29.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Tue 30.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Wed 31.01.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

February

Thu 01.02.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Fri 02.02.18 21:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Mon 05.02.18 20:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Tue 06.02.18 20:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Wed 07.02.18 20:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Thu 08.02.18 20:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris

Fri 09.02.18 20:00
Théâtre de la Bastille
Paris