Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, Theater der Welt Düsseldorf 2021, Baxter Theatre Centre and Les Théâtres de la Ville de Luxembourg, present
JM Coetzee’s
Life & Times of Michael K
Adapted for the stage by Lara Foot, in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company
4 - 27 Aug
Daily at 12:00
Assembly Hall
(Main Hall)
£12 - £20
The Baxter’s most ambitious production in recent years: JM Coetzee’s Life & Times of Michael K, adapted for the stage by Lara Foot, in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company, returns to The Baxter this July. The impressive South African cast includes theatre legends Sandra Prinsloo, Andrew Buckland, Faniswa Yisa, puppet master Craig Leo, Roshina Ratnam, Carlo Daniels, Markus Schabbing, Billy Langa and Nolufefe Ntshuntshe.
Epic in scale, Life & Times of Michael K is a multi-layered theatrical staging which combines puppetry, performance, film and evocative music, bringing to life Coetzee’s Booker Prize-winning novel.
The hauntingly beautiful story follows Michael K, a simple man who embarks on a journey through South Africa, ravaged by civil war, to return his mother to die on the farm where she was born. He finds strength in his own humanity, his profound connection to the earth and his unique path, which, as it unfolds, reveals to him his reason for living.
The creative team is made up of Lara Foot (adaptor, writer, director), Handspring Puppet Company (adaptors, puppet directors, design and makers), Patrick Curtis (set design) Kyle Shepherd (original music composition), Joshua Cutts (lighting), Fiona McPherson and Barrett de Kock (directors of photography and film), Yoav Dagan (videography and editing), Kirsti Cumming (projection design), Phyllis Midlane (costumes) and Simon Kohler (sound design).
“It was beguiling. Different. Great.”
- Birgit Kölgen, report-D
Price
Aug 4-8,11-13,18-20,25-27
12:00 (2h20m) £20.00 (£18.00)
Aug 9-10,15-17,22-24
12:00 (2h20m) £18.00 (£16.00)
Aug 3
12:00 (2h20m) £12.00
No Age restriction
140 Minutes (no interval)
Click here for block bookings or inquiries
Cast
Creative Team
Gallery
Germany Critics
“… a brilliant Coetzee adaptation …”
“… the lights went out and a spectacular evening of theatre began …”
“Lara Foot builds impressive images together with her puppet ensemble, taking plenty of time to let the precision in the collective guidance of a half-life-size marionette take effect.”
- Simon Strauss, Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung
“… a captivating counter-vision to all the violence and suffering Coetzee recounts.”
– Sascha Westphal, Nacht Kritik
“Great theatre ... we are witnesses to a great choreography of life and the suffering of life.”
“This is not a didactic play. It is poetic power, which confronts us so closely with pure struggle for survival…”
- Lothar Schröder, RP Online
“It was beguiling. Different. Great.”
The audience is gripped … at the end there is a genuine applause for the ensemble in Cape Town …”
-Birgit Kölgen, report-D
Cape Town Critics
“Lara Foot’s adaption in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company was an absolute triumph.”
- Andre du Toit, radio personality, speaker coach at TEDxCapeTown
“What Lara Foot and the Baxter Theatre have done is nothing short of amazing. It's ambitious, bold, and quite honestly is a great example of the power of theatre.”
- Faye Kabali-Kagwa, arts activist
“Yet the world of the play is lovingly rendered (by a stellar cast) such that the people who occupy it are specifically marked in these terms. The video projections that give the production its epic scale, as we trek with Michael across the Karoo or into the mountains, also lend it a particularity. On stage, then, the story of Michael K has a tangibility, a vividness and a “roundness ” that is absent from Coetzee’s allusive and elusive depiction.”
– Chris Thurman, Business Day
“Visually it is spectacular and achieves a moving world that is both elaborate and evocative … Foot has thrown all her energy and skill into this one and there are many memorable moments to witness and remember. It is a worthy production that captures the zeitgeist”
– Dianne de Beer, DeBeer Necessities
“With a sublime musical score, the overall effect is epic, making Life & Times of Michael K an accomplished, and pertinent work drawing much from the canon of South African theatre, and no doubt adding to it.”
– Steve Kretzmann
“Lara Foot, working in collaboration with the Handspring Puppet Company, has transfigured JM Coetzee’s Booker award winning novel, Life & Times of Michael K, from page to stage, with her signature magical realism, which imbues this gruelling tale with a light touch which speaks of hope and resilience.”
- Robyn Cohen
“The puppetry is masterful, and brings with it heightened symbolism in the choice of characters portrayed by puppets as opposed to those that are purely actor driven”
- Barbara Loots
“Lara Foot's adaptation of the novel is slick and compelling … This production is a treat for the senses.”
– Faeron Wheeler, Broadway World
