Castle of Holstebro, The

Synopsis: Experimental solo piece inspired by Hamlet. ‘The sequence in HAMLET which begins with the dialogue of the gravediggers and concludes with the outburst of the Prince against Laertes has two more protagonists: Yorick and Ophelia, the skull of the jester and the maid from whose flesh violets will grow. Two invisible characters: the others speak about them and show their lifeless remains on the stage. But the weeping of the nobles and the disenchanted song of the buffoons will be extinguished and the fury of history will roll away, leaving deserted and silent that moorland by the North sea which human beings have turned into a cemetery. Then Yorick and Ophelia will celebrate their wedding in the moonlight: serene and incestuous wedding of the Mother with the Child, of the Father with the Daughter, of the Old Man with the Virgin. Does Death, a grotesque Don Juan, seduce the girl, as in a Holbein etching? Or does the woman feed the child Death at her breast, nurturing it through the wheel of rebirth?' [Description taken from Odin Teatret website, 10/2007].
Language: English
Country: Denmark
Medium: Video
Technical information: Colour / Sound
Year of release: 1994
Duration: 55 mins

Director

Julia Varley

Writer

Eugenio Barba; Julia Varley

Cast

Julia Varley

Notes: In 2005 Exeter Digital Archives (University of Exeter) presented The Odin Week in which performances from Odin Teatret were digitally recorded and archived. DVDs of these performances are held at Holstebro, Denmark (the home of Odin) and at the University of Exeter. The Castle of Holstebro II was recorded 12/3/2005.
History: The production played for the first time in 1990.

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