Videoclip - faust in the box /english version

A Collage of the edited play with popular music of different generations, performed as
one-woman-show with handpuppets

directed by: Bridge Markland / Heike Gäßler

After the big success of the German original this is - faust in the box - the English version.
In a spectacular show as a one-woman-performance with hand puppets and pop music
Bridge Markland  conjures “Faust“ out of the box.
She performs high speed changes between Mephisto, Faust and Margaret while using hand puppets as her opponents.
Bridge Markland acts with intense physicality lip-syncing to the brilliant soundcollage of the voices of the various protagonists, plus compelling music.

Well known quotations from this most renowned of German dramas are juxtaposed  in English with the likes of The Rolling Stones, Rammstein, Robbie Williams, Metallica, Pink, Elvis, Madonna, Led Zeppelin, Depeche Mode, Placebo and many other music artists.
The classic play finds its contemporary equivalent in the sounds and lyrics of modern music and thus is opened up for many different generations.
This “Faust“ interpretation is not a parody, but a modern method of dealing with a classic. At the same time it demonstrates parallels between different streams of popular culture.
Audiences are amazed at how much the lyrics of a popsong have in common with a classic play. The central themes which occupy human beings remain the same. The piece carries the audiences to laughter and to tears as the storyline unfolds before them with humour, emotion, great sensibility and much grotesqueness.
Bridge Markland  performs “Faust“ in and out of a cardboard box. A simple, but very effective stage prop which changes it’s meaning according to the scene.

This „Faust“ interpretation delights audiences from 15 – 90 years of age and was praised at performances in Minneapolis, Chicago, St. Louis, Michigan, Kentucky, Mannheim, Karlsruhe and Berlin.



Pressvoices:

" ...The parallels between the well known text and it’s translation into pop songs of the past four decades are impressive and funny at the same time. Bridge Markland walks on the rather narrow edge between modern debate and persiflage.
When Margaret recognises at the end that she is on AC/DCs "Highway to hell", this borderline finally becomes blurred in a great and new attempt to interpret the classic for many generations. This comprehensive attempt was successful.“
Bernd Mand, Mannheimer Morgen, 7 May 08


”...Bridge Markland brings out the piece’s many levels. For her, as for Goethe, it’s about love and suffering, God and the devil. A simple parody which did nothing but ridicule could never be as enthralling and entertaining as this performance in a cardboard box.”
Oliver Kranz, Corso, Deutschlandfunk, 20 March 08


"... it works so well I became fascinated to see and hear just what was about to happen next.
... It is superbly performed and very very cleverly written and designed...."
4 stars
www.one4review.co.uk, 17 August 2009       


Performances:

faust in the box / english version
Germany: - English Theatre Berlin, 08, 09, 10               
- "Here & Now 2.0 A Theatre Festival", TIG7, Mannheim, 08
- Berufsakademie Mannheim, 08
                                                        
USA: -  University of Michigan Residential College, Ann Arbor / Michigan, 09
-  Goethe Institut, Chicago / Illinois, 09
-  Kranzberg Arts Center, presented by German Culture Centre St. Louis / Missouri, 09
-  Murray State University, Murray / Kentucky, 09

UK: - Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2009


faust in the box / german
Germany: - Saalbau Neukölln, Berlin, 06, 07, 08
-  100° Festival Berlin 07
- 15. International festival of puppetry / Figurentheaterfestival, Nuremberg, 07
- Theaterherbst Greiz, Thüringen, 08                                       
- Penguin's Days -children and young peoples theatre festival - Moers, 09
- LesArt Literature Festival, Dortmund, 09
- Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe / Insel, 10

Austria: Kulturlabor Stromboli, Hall in Tirol, 10

USA: - University to Minnesota / Minneapolis, 07
-  Saint John’s University / Minnesota, 07
-  Goethe Institut, Chicago / Illinois, 09
-  Kranzberg Arts Center, presented by German Culture Centre St. Louis / Missouri, 09

 and many other venues…