Zachary Oberzan Tell me Love is Real

In the winter of 2012, two famous American performance artists sat in anonymous hotel rooms on the West Coast, waiting to take the stage, and in a bizarre coincidence, over-dosed on the anxiety drug Xanax. One survived, one did not. The two individuals are Whitney Houston, who tragically died, and the author of this piece, who lived.

theater, performance
FR 18.04.2014 20:30
SA 19.04.2014 20:30

Incarcerated in a psychiatric ward, the author began an arduous and experimental journey towards recovery. What is life, and why should we live it, having had it thrust upon us like the assigned reading of a baffling mystery novel, the chapters jumbled, the text often incomprehensible? In the thirty-seven years of life leading up to this event, we find a simple but elusive answer: Love. The athletic struggle between Love and Death is played out time and again through life, as the pendulum swings back and forth between the heart and the grave. Longing for a hero to point the way, the ghosts of Buddy Holly, Amelia Earhart, Bruce Lee, Serge Gainsbourg, and a host of others are resurrected, but it is the words of Leonard Cohen that echo through the room: "I am not the one who loves/ It's love that chooses me." Right here, right now, the prayerful Oberzan calls upon you, the audience, for help. He will give you all he's got.

Tell me Love is Real is made hauntingly beautiful not in the least because of Oberzan’s willingness to expose his own want of love, and his revealing accounts of the hardships that riddle his own struggle. But the most powerful aspect of Tell Me Love Is Real is that it offers insight into the relationship that exists between the lonely actor up on stage, and the members of the audience. It forces the audience to recognize that it is we who must answer the call, and convince Oberzan that love is real. -- NATT&DAG, OSLO

In English

90 min, US, 2013
http://www.zacharyoberzan.com

Produced/ conceived/directed/video/performed by: Zachary Oberzan
Dramaturgy/producer/manager: Nicole Schuchardt
Lights/sound/video technician: David Lang, Harminder Judge
Stage consultant: Eike Böttcher
Costume assistant: Eric Gorsuch
Co-production: deSingel, Black Box Teater Oslo, Gessnerallee Zürich, brut Wien, BIT Teatergarasjen Bergen, Teaterhuset Avant Garden Trondheim, Kunstencentrum BUDA Kortrijk/NEXT Arts Festival

In addition to Tell Me Love Is Real, Oberzan shows Your Brother. Remember? on 11th and 12th April 2014.

see also
 
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