And We Cheerfully Put the Gods to Death
by Spreafico Eckly with Helga Guren and James Long
12+13 September 2024
5 years after the internationally acclaimed Footnote Number 12, James Long and Andrea Spreafico have returned with a new piece pulled from yet another non-theatrical text.
And We Cheerfully Put the Gods to Death takes a short story of Jorge Louis Borges, Ragnarök, as a starting point for an oneiric journey that transports the audience to Fargo, North Dakota and the Trolls Lounge, a bar where the local community of Norwegian-Americans gather for karaoke and drinks.
In this emerging fiction, Stavanger based actor Helga Guren assumes the identity of Anna –– a Norwegian visiting Fargo –– who enters the Trolls Lounge and sparks expectations that will not be met.
The show plays with prejudice, identity and delusion by inviting audience members on stage to have a drink at the Trolls Lounge and observe the actors as they shift from the first to third person to tell this story set in America’s Midwest.
With this piece Spreafico Eckly collaborates for the first time with Guren (Heddapris in 2019), a multi-talented performer whose practice moves through theatre, dance, cinema and music.
Written by James Long and Andrea Spreafico
Directed by Andrea Spreafico
Performed by Helga Guren and James Long
Produced by Spreafico Eckly
Set Design by Bjørnar Haveland, Karen Eide Bøen, Thomas Bruvik, Andrea Spreafico
Lighting Design by Thomas Bruvik
Financial production: Art & About
Research by Andrea Spreafico and Bjørnar Haveland.
Co-produced by Bit Teatergarasjen, Carte Blanche, Rosendal Teater
Supported by Art Council Norway, Fond for Lyd og Bilde, Bergen Kommune, SFU’s School for the Contemporary Arts, FFUK
A big thanks to: Findlay and Sandmark and the amazing people at Rimi-Imir Scenkunst, Leo Preston and Veronica Thorseth at Wrap, Nicola Gunn for helping us wrapping together the work of two weeks in a critical moment, to Bjørnar Haveland for patiently driving through the American Midwest for two weeks with Andrea, to Dennis Flesland and Arna Rennan for the insight in the Norwegian American culture, to Charlie, Linda Kathy, Jim, Marty, Sonja and all the other guests at the Troll Lounge in Fargo, to the Minneapolis May 17th crew, Ethan, Nels and Joseph, to the guy with the Norwegian flag themed pants for wearing a pair of Norwergian flag themed pants and to all the people on the other side of the Ocean that shared their stories with us. Also, thanks to Sven Åge Birkeland, who believed in this project from the first day, sorry Sven if we didn’t end the piece, as promised, with the Norwegian character in the wood chipper – it eventually just didn’t fit.