"WOYZECK"

In only two weeks, Det Færösche Compagnie, co-operating with several Nordic artists, created a grand total-theatre happening based on Georg Büchner’s Woyzeck.

Det Færösche Compagnie are Kristina Sørensen and Kjartan Hansen, the other Nordic artists are Hans Tórgarð, Trond Nedberg, Ida Løken, Öllegård Groundstroem and Magnus Lunell.

"Naturalism and expressionism come together in a wonderful way, and because the performance  is put together so intelligently as it is, it is possible for the performers to improvise just about anything into the whole (devising, I think it is called), to travel or jump in time and lead the main themes, morals, poverty, oppression and depravity into our age. The performers are good and shall have praise for that, but the credit is not only theirs. Because, in my opinion, Büchner, the author, should get his part of the credit. The play is based on a true story, of this Woyzeck, who was humiliated and mentally broken down, oppressed into murdering his love. This is documentarism, and in the documentary-genre, I have seen a lot of rubbish. Reality is damn difficult to deal with, but this is an intelligent interpretation of reality. So, thanks go out to the performers and the late Büchner.

But let’s not get too serious, because it isn’t. First and foremost, it is very festive and the laughs are plenty. For example: a very thorough doctor, torturing Woyzeck with  poker face and a scientific curiosity that goes as far as to taste different substances coming out of the victim’s body. Or Hans Tórgarð speaking gibberish-English. Or Marie, in Kristina Sørensen’s fine interpretation, all the time writhing like a snake, wiggling her tongue in an eternal struggle to be sexy. They are all of them performing very well, and the audience feels a bit afterwards like we’ve been to a party. But then again. What affected me most was a pair of baby rubber boots with holes in them. They touched me somehow more than many great plays have touched me.

Review written by Inger Smærup Sørensen, Art Critic, on "Listin"