From Natalie Woolman (The Stage)
Avant-garde writer and director Gerald Thomas is to set up his Dry Opera Company in London next year. Thomas, who has worked with Samuel Beckett and Philip Glass, is returning to the UK after 25 years living and working around the world because, he says, London “is where I feel I belong”. He established the first Dry Opera Company in Brazil in 1985, which he has now left, and another company of the same name in New York. Thomas said: “I learned to be an adult in London and for some inexplicable reason I have always declined any invitations from any kinds of festivals here or venues in England. We would always fly over England and never stop here. This time I decided to face the demons and I found the most amazing company.”
The company’s first production will be Thomas’ new work, Throats, which will run at the Pleasance in London. It starts with a car crash, after which the victims emerge in a state between life and death for a banquet in hell. Describing it as “very funny and dark”, he said: “That territory of inbetweenness is coming from Beckett, which I do, coming from this absurdity which I have created in these years of travelling and directing over the world. This limbo, this purgatory, leaves a huge amount of space for the writer, me, and a huge territory for the actors also.”
Throats will run from February 18 to March 27, with press night on February 24. The company will tour internationally afterwards. Future productions are being planned for London for the company of seven actors.
