Winter 2024: Caryl Churchill, Escaped Alone, Here We Go
Backstage
Information
Escaped Alone
In Escaped Alone, four women, Lena, Vi, Sally, and Mrs J(arrett), have come together to have tea in Sally’s back garden. Most of the time, they chat about everyday matters – their families, shopping, TV series, jokes, birds – but from time to time accounts of private catastrophes creep in, and disturbing and apocalyptic images of dystopian universes are conjured up by Mrs J. in seven solo speeches. – The title of the play alludes to the biblical figure of Job, who is apprised of the terrible blows of fate that cost him all his possessions and the lives of his entire family, by four messengers who on arrival proclaim “I only am escaped alone to tell thee”.
Here We Go
Personal catastrophe – in this case, death – is also at the heart of Here We Go. In Scene 1 (“Here We Go”), guests at a funeral party share their memories of the deceased. In Scene 2 (“After”), a recently deceased person is trying to get his bearings in the hereafter. In Scene 3 (“Getting There”), a very old and very sick person in nightclothes is helped by a carer to get dressed, then get undressed and back into nightclothes, and then, dressed again …
Performance
Art
Here is a sketch drawn by Nina Rugullis, an art student at Augsburg University, during the dress rehearsal, incorporating impressions of both plays.
