Centred on Franz Kafka, the performance interweaves three narrative strands: Kafka’s life, especially the family dynamics revealed in Letter to His Father; the alienated fate of Gregor Samsa in The Metamorphosis; and the story of a contemporary dancer bearing the same name, trapped in compulsive repetitions of performance material as he prepares for an imminent debut.
The creation of this production began in 2015 at Odin Teatret in Holstebro, Denmark. It marks the first time Eugenio Barba has directed a work outside his Danish company without its ensemble actors.

 

Lorenzo Gleijeses portrays Gregor Samsa, a forty-year-old dancer on the verge of the most important debut of his career. Driven by an obsessive desire for success, he cannot stop refining his dance, pushing himself relentlessly to achieve a machine-like perfection. Gradually, his striving unbalances him between performance and reality, work and life, progress and collapse. He is trapped in a nightmarish cocoon — not that of an insect, but a shell of dreams woven from Kafkaesque absurdity, the rhythm of dance, and the echoes of solitude. Here, he is both man and bug; both the performer driving himself forward, and a prisoner with no escape.

 

Gregor’s twisted, frantic body is at once unsettling and heartbreaking. This is not an allegory of transformation, but a gaze into the spiritual predicament of people in a performance-driven society: in our pursuit of perfection, do we become our own first victims?

 

 

 

Excerpts from the Press Review
It is not the first time that Lorenzo Gleijeses meets Eugenio Barba, the founder and director of the legendary Odin Teatret, an internationally renowned group, and a master who have marked the history of theatre for the last half century. But this time the meeting has given birth to an exciting and original show that is also the first signed by Barba as director “outside” the Odin, and not with the actors of his own company. [...] the physical score that Lorenzo Gleijeses has built in the enclosure of a small square white space, is surprising, for expressiveness and power of energy, and confirms the deep knowledge of the body language by this very special actor. His collaboration with two fundamental figures is strongly felt: we just talked about Barba. The great director of Odin Teatret accompanied Gleijeses in the construction of a physical language that took into account the myriad of images, even symbolic, of the novel; he accompanied him, as the director himself explains in the show brochure, through a double betrayal, by Lorenzo towards his own roots and by Barba himself towards his own group. But the other fundamental figure is Mirto Baliani, a great talent for sound and light, who has created here an unreal but really concrete habitat.
- Anna Bandettini, La Repubblica

it is a jerky dance, movements dictated by suffering, by the search for approval and the need to demonstrate. The recurring nightmare is its metamorphosis into an insect and the unheard alarm on the day of the debut. The show makes the atmosphere in the room and in the small world of the dancer claustrophobic, tightening more and more around him to the point of imploding. The music undergoes an acceleration, the lights shatter, while his personality goes towards deconstruction. That's where the escape begins.
- Raffaella Roversi, Santinaria.it

 

Kafka enters into the claustrophobic ménage of a hyperkinetic performer whose anxiety about his debut, combined with a perverse dedication to the theatrical profession, has transformed into the alter-ego of the cleaning robot with which he shares the scenic space. Lorenzo Gleijeses is Samsa, insecure and perfectionist, who never stops rehearsing, inside or outside the theater. [...] Curious and original mixture of physical expression and spoken word, the work, which has the imprint of the Third Theater of which Eugenio Barba is the very Master, is perturbing but also arouses empathy, because the story of Gregor, who we hope is at least a little pacified in the end, is the story of everyone, unable to refuse yet another commitment or to enjoy any unproductive time.

- Maura Sesia, La Repubblica

 

Director Introduction
Eugenio Barba is the founder of Odin Teatret and the International School of Theatre Anthropology (ISTA), and a pioneer and founding figure of the theoretical system of Theatre Anthropology. He is one of the most influential theatre innovators and thinkers of the second half of the 20th century. Through cross-cultural physical training and theatrical practice, he redefined the nature of performers’ craft and performance, and profoundly shaped the creative direction of contemporary theatre. His artistic exploration and theoretical construction over more than half a century continue to provide essential intellectual resources and practical approaches for theatre practitioners worldwide.

 

Lorenzo Gleijeses is an actor, physical performer and director working mainly in theatre and film, and one of the most representative leading Italian actors of his generation. He made his stage debut in 1991 at the age of 10 with his father Geppy and renowned Italian actress Regina Bianchi. In 2002, he began collaborating with Odin Teatret, founded by Julia Varley and Eugenio Barba. In 2006, he received the Ubu Award for Best New Italian Actor. He has collaborated with numerous international masters, including the iconic Lithuanian theatre director Eimuntas Nekrošius, the world-renowned physical theatre master Koji Yoshida, the European theatre giant Eugenio Barba, as well as internationally celebrated directors such as Paolo Sorrentino, Mario Martone and Lindsay Kemp. His works have been presented at Italy’s most prestigious theatres and festivals, as well as at leading international venues and festivals in France, Denmark, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Poland, Argentina and other countries.

 

Julia Varley has been a key performer of Odin Teatret (Denmark) since 1976. She is also active as a director, teacher, organiser and writer. In 1986, she co‑founded the Magdalena Project, an international network of women in contemporary theatre. She curates the Transit Festival of Women in Theatre in Holstebro (Denmark) and serves as editor of *Open Page*, a journal dedicated to women’s work in theatre.

 

Credit
Performed by Lorenzo Gleijeses
Dramaturgy and Directors: Eugenio Barba, Lorenzo Gleijeses, Julia Varley
Sound and Lights: Mirto Baliani
Choreographic Elements: Michele Di Stefano
Dramaturgical Consultant: Chiara Lagani
Set Design: Roberto Crea
Assistant Director: Manolo Muoio
Voices-over: Eugenio Barba, Geppy Gleijeses, Maria Alberta Navello, Julia Varley
Produced by Dear Friends, Odin Teatre