Hamletmachine/Medeaplays
UNDERGROUND ARTS
APRIL 2012
Heiner Müller’s Hamletmachine and Medeaplays connect with The Renegade Company’s mission to tell familiar stories in unfamiliar ways. Written in the 1980's, these works deconstruct the stories of Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Euripides’ Medea and tells them from a post-modern view. Müller takes these myths and uses them as an allegory to express the angst of the sociopolitical catastrophe Germany was in during the Cold War. These works assess the need for separation and that nuclear annihilation is devastingly possible. Juxtaposing experimental industrial English and German bands like Throbbing Gristle, Bauhaus, D.A.F, Kraftwerk, and Einstürzende Neubauten with Heiner Muller’s poetry evoke power and expression against authority. The production employs an atmospheric approach where accessing the five senses creates a unique sensory experience.