A new adaptation of Hedda Gabler, the world premiere of a new dance theatre piece and the UK premiere of German playwright Falk Richter’s State Of Emergency comprise the Gate’s new season.
I Am Falling, the Gate’s hit dance theatre piece from earlier this year, also gets a revival, but at Sadler’s Wells’s Lilian Baylis studio.
The season at the Notting Hill theatre aims to build on its reputation for ‘ambitious, provocative and vital international work’ and continue exploring the possibilities of dance theatre.
Lucy Kirkwood’s adaptation of Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, entitled simply Hedda, opens the season, running from 21 August to 27 September. Co-Artistic Director Carrie Cracknell directs the piece which updates Ibsen’s classic to the 21st century. Trapped in a marriage to a man she no longer loves, Hedda finds passion and excitement by hurting others. Caged and caught between three men, something must give.
The world premiere production of Hedda stars Adrian Bower, whose previous credits include the Bush and West End hit Elling. Also in the cast are Cara Horgan, Christopher Obi, Alice Patten and Cath Whitefield.
Hedda is followed by Richter’s Orwellian drama State Of Emergency (6 November to 13 December). Directed by Maria Aberg, it tells of a married couple in an ideal neighbourhood. But what happens when this utopian world becomes a new form of prison?
The Gate’s season is completed by the world premiere of Alexandra Wood’s La Ronde-inspired Unbroken, which is directed by Gate co-Artistic Director Natalie Abrahami and features choreography by Ugo Dehaes. The piece, which runs from 5 February to 7 March, sees dance and text intertwine to reveal the spoken and unspoken, seen and unseen dynamics between people in search of physical and emotional fulfilment.
This is the second time that Wood and Abrahami have collaborated, following the Royal Court production of The Eleventh Capital.
The transfer of I Am Falling, which runs at the Lilian Baylis from 29 October to 1 November, marks the start of a new partnership between the fringe theatre and the dance powerhouse. The production, which stars Ben Duke, Gawn Grainger and Petra Soor, follows the effects of an aging married couple taking their own lives.
MA