Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) 2022 presents
OBLOMOW REVISITED
by Luk Perceval and Nele Stuhler / Schauspiel Köln
Country: Germany | Running Time: 157 |Language: German | Year Of Inception: 2021
About OBLOMOW REVISITED
In November 2020, a video clip from the German federal government caused a commotion. With the hashtag #besonderehelden, the politicians called on people to be “as lazy as racoons” and to turn the “couch into a front line”. The message was clear: who stays at home is a hero. Tasteless or a funny gag? Controversial discussion arose among the public. The narrative of the no-sayers is often found in literature; for example in Melville’s “Bartleby the Scrivener”, Thoreau’s “Walden” or Moshfegh’s “My Year of Rest and Relaxation”.
Iwan Gontscharow’s protagonist Oblomow also stays at home, sinks into daydreams on the divan and is characterised by his sloth; ultimately not even his closest friends are able to motivate him. Luk Perceval and Nele Stuhler updated the novel, used it as a loose foil and looked for parallels to the reality of our lives during the lockdown. They were interested in those who could not or did not want to easily find their way back into everyday life or their jobs after this challenging months. At the same time, they showed what the principles of the novel can tell us when they are applied to the theater institution. Why do theater people invest so much in their jobs, where doing “nothing” is often neglected? And who is actually “allowed” to step out and when? What happens to no-sayers and what to the system if one person falls out?
In preparing for OBLOMOW REVISITED the team asked itself how a theater project could be staged using different layers of multimedia. The result is a multi-perspective theater project consisting of three parts: 1.) a Twitch channel by the Oblomow actress Luana Velis 2.) a tumblr blog and an Instagram channel 3.) a hybrid final premiere that took place at the Schauspiel Köln and was streamed simultaneously on twitch for about 3.000-5.000 users. The first two parts were already created at the beginning of the rehearsals to make the work process visible. So please look at the digital narration over the entire production period, there is no such thing as a classic premiere in the sense of an “end product”.
Twitch is used by 17.5 million people every day. The live streaming video portal was founded in 2011 and is primarily used to broadcast video games. During the pandemic, streamers began to film their private lives at home. Thousands watched laundry, cooking, gardening, sleeping, talking for several hours. Perceval’s aim is to make theater accessible to an audience that does not normally go to the theatre. This was possible here thanks to Twitch. With the help of the live chat, we entered into an interactive exchange with the audience and found out why people no longer go to the theater. They connected to the themes of OBLOMOW REVISITED; thought about the relationship to their own job, the lack of free time or the taboo on laziness. The desire for exchange was given: on Instagram we received posts after almost every stream. The number of viewers varied between 20 and 8,000 during our ca. 50 live streams.
About Luk Perceval and Nele Stuhler / Schauspiel Köln
Luk Perceval, born in Lommel/Belgium in 1957, is a director and author. Along with Jan Decorte, Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker, Jan Fabre and Wim Vandekeybus, he is one of the most important representatives of the outstanding »Flemish wave« of the 1980s and 1990s.
SCHLACHTEN! (1999), the ten-hour adaptation of the War of the Roses based on William Shakespeare at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg, brought Perceval his breakthrough in Germany. Several invitations to the Berlin Theatertreffen followed, as well as engagements at the Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin, the Thalia Theater in Hamburg, the Münchner Kammerspiele, the Schauspiel Köln, the Deutsche Staatsoper Berlin, the Wiener Festwochen, the Salzburg Festival and the Ruhrtriennale.
Nele Stuhler is a performance artist, author and director. Her first theater works were created in the youth theater of the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz “P14”. Here she was also involved in productions by René Pollesch and Dimiter Gotscheff. She studied applied theater studies in Gießen and directing in Zurich. In 2011, together with Stephan Dorn and Falk Rößler, she founded the theater collective FUX, which searches for new theatrical formats by questioning existing stage forms and with whom she has realized several projects. She also works closely with Jan Koslowski. “Société des Amis – Tindermatch im Oderbruch” was shown at the Körber-Studio Junge Regie and at the Fast Forward Festival Braunschweig.
About The Festival
The Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) is an annual event showcasing films drawn from the world of theatre and performance. The festival presents experimental, emerging, and established theatre artists and filmmakers from around the world to audiences and industry professionals. The 7th annual festival will focus on work for the screen created by theatre artists during the Time of Corona. The festival will be held digitally from March 1st – 15th 2022.
Explore projects created under OBLOMOW REVISITED from March 1st to March 15th 2022 on the Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) website.
Support this project by Luk Perceval and Nele Stuhler / Schauspiel Köln by making a direct donation to them at the following details:
Read more about Luk Perceval and Nele Stuhler / Schauspiel Köln and OBLOMOW REVISITED at (https://www.schauspiel.koeln/en/schedule/premieren-21-22/oblomowa-revisited/) or get in touch at lea.goebel@schauspiel.koeln / “instagram @schauspiel.koeln @lukpercevalandcie @nele_tischbein @oblomow_revisited” “Twitter: @LeaGoebel @schauspielkoeln @kissing_coppers
For more visit:
- https://www.sueddeutsche.de/kultur/schauspiel-koeln-proben-oblomow-perceval-twitch-1.5460879
- https://www.nzz.ch/feuilleton/schauspiel-koeln-wir-proben-oblomow-und-das-zeigen-wir-ld.1652993
- https://www.die-deutsche-buehne.de/erfuellte-arbeit-oder-passioniertes-nichts-tun
- https://www.die-deutsche-buehne.de/kritiken/kunst-macht-zu-viel-arbeit
- https://www.ladn.eu/mondes-creatifs/twitch-dramazon-prime-theatre-revolution-numerique/
- https://nachtkritik.de/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=20227:oblomow-revisited-schauspiel-koeln-eine-hybride-gontscharow-adaption-von-luk-perceval&catid=84:schauspiel-koeln&Itemid=40
- https://www1.wdr.de/fernsehen/west-art/sendungen/uebersichtwestart544.html
- https://nachtkritik.plus/de_DE/films/oblomow-revisited-von-luk-perceval-gespra.19974
