111

Things to do

CPH STAGE: Energetic, fun, cheeky, flippant and captivating performance art

admin
May 25th, 2017


This article is more than 7 years old.

Once again, CPH STAGE brings important international stage art to Denmark. This year, internationally-acclaimed visionary stage auteur Kirsten Dehlholm from Hotel Pro Forma has exclusively selected the opening show on May 31 – ‘The Blind Poet’ by Jan Lauwers and Needcompany.

This innovative opening performance should set the standard for the whole festival (photo: Bea Borges)

‘The Blind Poet’ gives the audience a unique opportunity to experience an extraordinarily innovative European performance.

This company truly belongs to the Champions League of the performing arts. ‘The Blind Poet’ is produced by Belgian director Jan Lauwers and will be presented by CPH STAGE, in close collaboration with The Royal Danish Theatre.

It begins with the family trees …
This year’s opening show is international on more than one level. To begin with, the play has been created by the international, multilingual and inter-disciplinary performance group Needcompany. Director Jan Lauwers also lives up to and underlines the festival’s important focus on diversity. He does this by letting the show take its starting point in the family trees, cultures and languages of the performers.

It has already become a proud tradition at CPH STAGE to open with an international performance selected by a prominent member of the performing arts society. This creates an essential perspective on the program, which in itself is a project driven by a fruitful collaboration between CPH STAGE and international theatres, artists and other members of the society. Director of Hotel Pro Forma, Kirsten Dehlholm, was an obvious choice. She is the ‘grande dame’ of the Danish performing arts.

The Blind Poet’ is original
“Energetic, fun, cheeky, flippant and catchy. ‘The Blind Poet’ is an original bet on a performance, that will make performance theatre, acting, dance, music and storytelling unite at a higher level,” Kirsten Dehlholm declares, when asked about why she chose ‘The Blind Poet’ for this years opening show.

This spectacular performance explores identity as a concept in the current multicultural Europe. It creates a new story that is based on different nationalities, cultures and languages. Seven scenes, significantly melodic and very different, ask the question: How much of history has been determined by lies, random meetings and events?

‘The Blind Poet’ plays May 31 at 19:00 at The Royal Danish Theatre/The Old Stage right after the opening of CPH STAGE festival centre at the foyer at The Royal Danish Playhouse.

After the show, there will be a talk with Kirsten Dehlholm and director Jan Lauwers.


Share

Most popular

Subscribe to our newsletter

Sign up to receive The Daily Post

















Latest Podcast

A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”