Presented with
Jerk might be unbearable for some. But in our eyes, theater so wisely woven with reality, however violent, is wholesome.” – Les Inrockuptibles, France
Jan 21–24, 8pmVivo Media Arts CentrePost-show talkback Jan 22, led by Glenn Alteen
Running Time 55m
Direction Gisèle Vienne
Text and Dramaturgy Dennis Cooper
Performed by and created in collaboration with Jonathan Capdevielle
Music Peter Rehberg (original music) and El Mundo Frio of Corrupted
FOR MATURE AUDIENCES ONLY
Gisèle Vienne’s Jerk is based on the chilling text of Dennis Cooper, an author deemed “the most dangerous writer in America” by the Village Voice. It is a story told from the vantage point of David Brooks, the real life accomplice to Texas serial killer Dean Corll who was responsible for the deaths of more than 25 teenage boys in the early 1970s.
Devised as a play within a play, the audience takes the role of a psychology class visiting Brooks (played by Jonathan Capdevielle) as he serves his life sentence in prison. Fascination, humour, madness and sheer terror are melded in his puppet show recreations of the gruesome, sexually charged murders. Jerk is theatre at its starkest, a harrowing journey into the most hidden corners of the human psyche.
“Jerk shrewdly explores this relationship between fantasy and reality. The violent text verges on gore, setting a mood of anxiety that is only heightened by the first-person narration, delivered like matter-of-fact testimony.” – Liberation, France
Gisèle Vienne is a choreographer, director, visual and performance artist who lives and works in Grenoble and Paris. One of France’s rising stars, Vienne’s radical work presents the horror of fantasy and the horror of reality in such a way that the two become impossible to distinguish.
www.g-v.fr
With the support of the Consulat Général de France à Vancouver
Tickets Advance $24/30; at door $26/32
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RSVP to Jerk on the PuSh Festival facebook page
Related postings on PuShing It: The PuSh Festival Blog
January 7, 2010 - PuSh 2010 Curatorial Statement: Jerk
Links
Visit Dennis Cooper and Gisèle Vienne online
Watch Gisèle Vienne talk about Jerk on YouTube
Our co-presenting partner for this show is grunt gallery
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