Being ‘Other’ – The Holocaust on Stage
Performances and screenings
Friday 25 January 2013
An evening of short performances and video screenings related to the Holocaust and how we view people today who are different to us.
The programme for the evening was as follows:
- Extracts from This Way for the Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen - Seth Morgan from the Life and Death Orchestra performed songs and scenes from their musical about Darfur and Auschwitz. We follow the life of Tadeusz Borowski, the polish writer and poet who was a prisoner at Auschwitz. The title song, This Way For The Gas, Ladies and Gentlemen, adapted from a short story by Borowski, depicts an ordinary day in the gas chambers detailing the Zyklon B, the cruelty of the SS, the transports, the summary executions, and the slaughter.
- A Selection of Short Pieces by Master’s students from East 15 Acting School, University of Essex, who presented a series of short scenes and work in progress responding to the Holocaust and the theme of ‘Being Other’. Facilitated by Andrea Brooks, Head of MA Acting at East 15.
- Music by Abigail the Brave, a contemporary folk singer songwriter whose soulful music has an astute social consciousness. A student of Literature at the University, Abi is a regular favourite at The Hook, Lakeside Theatre’s open mic night.
- Wo ist das Vögelchen? (Watch the birdie), a short film by artist Martha Haversham, which was a culmination of her residency at the University of Essex for Holocaust Memorial Week.
- A screening of the film Resistance by Roaring Girls Production, founded by Liz Crow, an artist-activist for disabled people working with film, audio and text, and drawn to the power of creative work as a tool for change. Her work has been shown at Tate Modern, The British Film Institute and Washington DC’s Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, as well as on television and at festivals internationally. Recent works include ‘Resistance: which way the future?’, a touring film-based installation which explores the Nazi campaign against disabled people and what it means for us all today, and her appearance on the Fourth Plinth in London’s Trafalgar Square as part of sculptor Antony Gormley’s “One & Other” project: she sat in her wheelchair wearing full Nazi regalia to draw attention to a hidden history and the message it holds for today. (More information on Liz Crow and her work can be found in the taster issue of The Holocaust in History and Memory Vol. 5)
- The Portrayal of the Roma: a Media Betrayal, by Lorna Gibb (read by Andrea Brooks). Lorna Gibb is a freelance author and Lecturer in Creative Writing in the Media Department at Middlesex University London. Interested in Roma issues since the late 1980s when she first started working with Yugoslavian Kalderesh, this powerpoint performance focused on portrayals of Roma and the ways the perception of the Roma by the wider public is manipulated as a result of that portrayal.
Venue: Lakeside Theatre, University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester CO4 3SQ