Chouf Ouchouf
devised and directed by Martin Zimmermann & Dimitri de Perrot, performed by the Groupe Acrobatique de Tangier
The Medina, the old quarter, where it's ten to a house, and a hundred to the narrowest street. Shout or you won't be heard; push to the front or never be seen. Life and colour lies round every corner, animals and cigarette hawkers fill the squares. The city is unruly, chaotic, but no matter the world there are men of power, and beneath the clamour and fights of the market are the whispers of its other life. Dusk falls like a shutter, then the night. Silently the walls open, and amid the maze-like streets and along the rooftops figures move on secret agendas. What, or who, is in the bag?
The Groupe returned to the UK with a show about what they know best their home the Groupe Acrobatique de Tangier collaborate with Swiss artists Zimmermann and de Perrot to capture the danger, joy and urgency of life in Tangiers. Those who saw the Groupe's last production, Taoub, will find the group more mature, stronger, yet with the same rough charm, and the same rich language of vernacular acrobatics passed from generation to generation that is as natural to them as song. Here they move through a set that floats apart and reassembles to represent the many faces of a bewildering and exciting landscape, taking in the old and the nearly new in search of the city's beating heart.
...with an insouciant brilliance, they fill the stage with multiple back-flips, dizzying cartwheels, perilous human pyramids and vaulting trampoline stunts
everyone was spellbound. The Guardian on previous show Taoub
'The Skinny' talks to Rachel Clare about Moroccan acrobatics ahead of the tour here.
Toured:
Eden Court, Inverness
12-13 April
www.eden-court.co.uk
macrobert, University of Stirling
16-17 April
www.macrobert.org
Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, London
21-25 April
www.southbankcentre.co.uk
Hall for Cornwall, Truro
28-29 April
www.hallforcornwall.co.uk
The Nuffield Theatre, Southampton
2-3 May
www.nuffieldtheatre.co.uk
Corn Exchange, Brighton, Brighton Festival
7-9 May
www.brightonfestival.org
Theatre Royal Norwich, Norfolk and Norwich Festival
13-14 May
www.nnfestival.org.uk
www.theatreroyalnorwich.co.uk
65 mins duration
Suitable for ages 7 to adult
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