Kassandra-speaking in twelve voices
From the start of her career Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker has regularly made performances in which text plays an important part. In a more recent period (cf. Just Before, I said I, Quartett, In Real Time) this resulted in an almost systematic study of the relationship between words and movement. For all these performances Anne Teresa worked in collaboration with her sister Jolente (Tg Stan). This is also true of Kassandra. speaking in twelve voices, which was created in 2004.
Cassandra, one of the daughters of King Priam of Troy, is given the gift of prophesy by the god Apollo. However, because she refuses to oblige the god, he takes revenge: Cassandra will predict the future but nobody will believe her. After the Trojan War Agamemnon takes Cassandra with him as a slave to Greece.
The writer and actor Oscar van Woensel (Dood Paard) wrote an English script for the seven women and five men of the Rosas company in which he allows Cassandra to speak in twelve voices: as many voices as there are dancers on stage. The whole performance takes place in the last twelve seconds of Cassandra's life. It is just like the film she sees flashing past at the moment of her death, into which are concentrated both her whole life and the lives of the Greek mythological figures around her. One character picks up the thread of the story from another. Most of them are dressed in black skirts. A huge moving wall often blocks their way on stage. Next to, in front of, behind and on this wall they speak their lines and they too start to move. When dancers turn actor the text always becomes more physical; their speech is more raw and searching than that of actors.
The Kassandra Rosas will play this season is a revised version of the 2004 performance. The most important change is in the balance between text and movement: the addition of more extensive movement material makes the performance more like pure dance, as in former projects like Just Before and In Real Time.
mise en scène et chorégraphie Jolente De Keersmaeker & Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker
créé, acté et dansé par Beniamin Boar, Marta Coronado, Fumiyo Ikeda, Cynthia Loemij, Elizaveta Penkóva, Taka Shamoto, Igor Shyshko, Clinton Stringer, Giulia Sugranyes, Johan Thelander, Rosalba Torres Guerrero, Jakub Truszkowski
également dansé par Etienne Guilloteau
texte Oscar van Woensel
décor, éclairage Jan Joris Lamers
assistant éclairage Kristof Van Dijck, Rudi Antonissen
assistant décor Joris Erven, Jan Herinckx
costumes An D'Huys
assistance Anne-Catherine Kunz
musique Filip Kowlier Rosas & Salva Sanchis
professeur de rythme Michel Debrulle
conseil historique Bart Claes
répétitrice Pascale Gigon
assistance à la production artistique Anne Van Aerschot
production manager Freek Boey
assistance Jitske Vandenbussche
stage manager Kris Van Aert
son Alexandre Fostier, Caroline Wagner
professeurs Rita Poelvoorde, Salva Sanchis, Khosro Adibi, Chrysa Parkinson, Stefan Dreher
kinesitherapie Evelyne Sax
remerciements Bruno Pieters, Françoise Marechal, Véronique Branquino, Sofie D'Hoore, Claire Diez, Patrick De Muynck, Frank Vandezande, Mark De Wit, Paul Verhagen, Peter Van Acker, François Maillot, Koen Raes, personnel Kaaitheater, Pandora, Martine Bom, Miranda Prein, Thierry De Mey, Marianne Kiekens
production Rosas, De Munt/La Monnaie
coproduction Théâtre de la Ville / Paris, Léonard de Vinci / Opéra de Rouen
création Brussels, Kaaitheater, 10 mars 2004
