A Cardboard Citizens ProductionWoyzeck
by Georg Büchner
February 27th 2008 - March 15th 2008
Show starts: 19:30 (15:00 matinees)
Plagued by haunting voices and a paranoid fear of conspiracy, Franz Woyzeck is a man trying to make sense of things and failing. Struggling to support his wayward girlfriend Marie and their young child, he lends his body to medical experimentation. His distrust and anger spirals until one day, in an attempt to make the real and imagined voices stop for good, he takes a knife.....
“What a lovely day - sky so grey, you could just bang a nail into it and hang yourself.”
Hailed by 20th century critics as the first truly modern play, Büchner's masterpiece written in 1837 remains powerful and relevant both in content and style. With its staccato, filmic style, one scene bleeding into another, it penetrates soul and psyche like a blade through flesh. Laced with haunting voices and a paranoid fear of conspiracy, the play confronts the links between poverty, mental health and the casual violence of everyday life that is only too familiar to many who live on the streets.
Following the play there will be a Forum Theatre session which will give audience members the chance to practically and creatively engage with the action on stage. On two occasions post-show events will replace the 2nd act of Forum Theatre.
Wednesday 5th March
A reading of Lenz by Georg Buchner.
Wednesday 12th March
Post show debate
“Another man has lost the plot, killed someone and got away with it.” 25 January 2008, The Guardian
Professor Germaine Greer, commenting on the case of John Hogan
In light of Franz Woyzeck, (who didn’t get off) a debate about mental health and diminished responsibility.
Speakers
Kathryn Abel - Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist, Manchester University
Ed Bullmore - Prof. of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge
John Garret - Social worker, START team
Adrian Jackson - Chief Executive and Artistic Director, Cardboard Citizens
Phil Timms - Consultant Psychiatrist, South London and Maudsley NHS Trust
"...This is one of the best productions of Büchner's classsic un-finished play I have ever seen...company and play are so perfectly matched."
The Guardian
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Creative Team
Directed and Adapted by |
- Adrian Jackson |
From a Literal Translation by |
- Chris Atkinson |
Design by |
- Fred Meller |
Musical Direction by |
- David Baird |
Produced by |
- Roy Luxford |
Supported by
Reviews
Büchner’s ‘Woyzeck’ seems to be flavour of the month for theatre companies at the moment. The play is especially popular with international and physical companies, who use the bare bones of this fragmentary, unfinished piece as a peg from which to hang their interpretative shtick. Cardboard Citizens’s production offers a rare chance to see a straightforward performance of the text. It also demonstrates why so many companies opt to pick and choose from the play. Adrian Jackson’s production, influenced by his work with Augusto Boal, offers a psychological-realist approach to the characters, mixed with Brechtian direct address and some off-the-wall clownery, including a live rat complete with a live video feed, which projects an enormous image of the wriggling creature on to the back wall – causing several audience members to squirm in their seats. However, there is a serious intent behind all this wackiness. Following the performance of the play proper, audience members can take part in a forum discussion of the issues suggested by the play. This second half to the piece is far more successful, lively and engaging than what amounts to a fairly pedestrian production of the play itself. While the themes marry well with a company that works with the formerly homeless, there are a few too many professional actors here to completely dispel the feeling that this connection has not been thoroughly explored, while simultaneously not fully realising a successful dramatic interpretation. 3 Stars - Andrew Haydon
Time Out Read Full Review
Georg Büchner's unfinished drama, written in about 1836 and based on a real-life murder case, has attracted a rich array of practitioners, from Sarah Kane and Robert Wilson to the inventive Icelandic company Vesturport. With its fragmentation, the force of its imagery and the enduring relevance of its themes of disconnection, dehumanisation, injustice and betrayal, it lends itself to imaginative reinterpretation. This production by the homeless people's company Cardboard Citizens, presented with Forum Theatre sessions in the manner of Augusto Boal, as well as various workshops and after-show debates, makes provocative viewing. First seen in 2003 and directed by Adrian Jackson, it depicts a very modern kind of alienation: Woyzeck, prey to the terrifying voices in his head, is isolated in a world that, despite the interventions of intrigued medics, understands his torment little and by and large cares less. It's a fascinating critique of the way in which mental illness stigmatises, and of how a differing perception of facts and events can separate an individual from mainstream society. Fred Meller's set, with its swirly carpets, tatty furniture and pinging microwave, resembles a drop-in centre for the marginalised. Here, Jennifer Kidd's Marie holds a baby represented by a teddy bear; Woyzeck's friend Andres smashes a chair with unrestrained violence, while, as Woyzeck himself, Simeon Moore, in stained tracksuit bottoms and sweatshirt, tramps on a treadmill, his life of poverty and meaningless work running away from beneath him. It all feels at once brutally real and grotesquely nightmarish, the horror accentuated by a later circus scene in which Marie and Woyzeck, longing for a glimpse of wonder or beauty, instead gaze on a man wearing a monkey's head and a supposedly miraculous astronomical horse played by a large live rat. As Woyzeck's mental disintegration accelerates, it's clear he will gain little help from a white-coat who barely regards him as human, but who gulps down mouthfuls of his urine in her thirst for knowledge about his disorder. The production is ragged and rough, but its approach is not unsuited to Büchner's fractured writing, and its threadbare aesthetic is poignantly unlovely. Raw but rewarding. 3 Stars - Sam Marlowe
The Times Read Full Review
A rat playing a horse, a teddy bear playing the role of a baby and a man dressed up as circus monkey all come together in Cardboard Citizens' production of Woyzeck. Written by Georg Büchner in 1837, Woyzeck remained unfinished due to his untimely death at the age of twenty three but has been variously "finished" by a variety of authors and translators. Franz Woyzeck lends his body to medical experimentation in order to earn extra money to support his girlfriend Marie and their young child. Whether it is as a result of the experiments or social circumstance Woyzeck's mind gradually deteriorates as his feelings of paranoia spiral out of control. If the aim of this production was to make the audience feel the same sense of confusion as Woyzeck is suffering from then I suppose you could say it was a success. Seven actors sat in a line across the stage playing a variety of roles. Are these characters real? Are they merely in Woyzeck's mind? Or are we being presented with his distorted versions of these characters? All of which are probably correct assumptions. However it made it virtually impossible to grasp onto any sense of a thread of a plot. After about thirty minutes of being presented with various displays of paranoia and disillusion, in a variety of forms through various mediums I became numb to Woyzeck's mental deterioration. The abstract nature of the performance sacrificed the idea of the personal. Yes it was clear that Woyzeck was suffering deeply as Simeon Moore as Woyzeck gradually regressed in his speech patterns and his movements became more and more erratic. However, ultimately I didn't actually care. I felt no sympathy for this character or for those around him and there was no sense of consequence for his actions. Act 2 took the form of forum theatre, where the audience were encouraged to shout out what they had got from the play. We were then broken into groups of three to work on role play. Character A and B engaged in a conversation whilst character C constantly undermined everything that A was saying. Certainly an interesting way in which to illustrate the frustration of hearing voices and the coping mechanisms that one adapts to deal with this infliction but should one have to engage in a post-show discussion and workshop in order to make sense of what they have just seen? The forum then allowed members of the audience to interrupt the actors as they re-enacted scenes from the play in order to say what they would have done differently. Again, I can appreciate what Cardboard Citizens are trying to achieve and this style of theatre is ideal for A-Level and drama students or the interactive work they do with homeless people helping them to make sense of their own circumstances in relation to the play. However, I'd personally rather not be taken back to school during a night at the theatre. Whilst the forum theatre did actually help me to understand the aims of the production which had totally bypassed me in the first act, this should not have been the case. Woyzeck should stand alone as a piece of theatre but sadly in this instance it did not. Review by Rachel Sheridan (2008)
British Theatre Guide Read Full Review