An installation of wedding images, dreams, memories, nightmares and drunken visions.

It is his wedding morning. He drank. A lot. They bring him home and wind the alarm clock. And they leave. In his drunken mind a whirl of wedding ceremonies begins to twist when he is the bridegroom for a while and then the best man, a man in the crowd or even the man who weds the couple. The music plays unsoundly, the best man has forgotten the rings, the bride does not have the bouquet, her dress or her underwear. Sometimes even the bride is missing. Sometimes there are two brides or three but only one bridegroom. And all the brides want to get married.



He listens to an old myth about two people who love each other to death, birds are flying through his flat, his shoes are in fire and a wild wedding procession walks across his bed. A whirl of images and visions can not be stopped. He staggers through his cold flat, falls asleep, dreams about an ideal woman, flushes the nightmares, cries for his beloved to help him and does not know what is real and what is a dream. And the alarm clock does not ring.



Grotesque, visual, physical and dance performance of Continuo Theatre. Street theatre inspired by wedding ceremonies of aborigine tribes, mating rituals of animals, knights' tournaments, sport competitions, gunmen's duels and actor's memories of their own weddings and divorces.


 




THEATRE CRITICS ABOUT
BEFORE YOUR DREAMS PART YOU:


...This new performance of Continuo Theatre also belongs to open air, to city quiet corners and gardens, to castle or mansion courtyards but first of all to streets and squares. This is due to expressive means: grotesquely stylised characters which take advantage of excellent physical skills of all the actors, impressive props, marionettes, stilts, live music, precise work with lights, fire and water. But this time also more intensely thanks to thematic plan of the performance. The performance is a montage of images which seem to come from everyday observations, our own dreams, memories, nightmares and drunken visions which are adequately hyperbolised on the directorial, visual and music level.

Whirl of uneasy thoughts of the last moments of freedom is packed into one short night before the wedding. Time of awakened subcounsciousness after massive drinking to freedom - a very successful entry of the man part of the ensemble who perform with perfect physical creations - till the alarm clock rings in the morning and closes one life period to open another one which for the present offers more of questions than hope.

The reinforced ensemble of Continuo Theatre seems to be harmonised. The man part of the ensemble happily changes into timeless wanderers in fate (beginning from the Jews of Galicia to 'Sokol' cyclists and hasty city 'yuppies' in the splendid suitcase fight of life and death)...

It is a habit with Continuo Theatre that the spectator is always being dismayed by almost vain number of interesting ideas of the stage design, but it is not the purpose to show what the actors can do (and much they can!) but to offer a real message through a number of well mastered imaginative techniques. The message comes in a detail as it is with good poets and this detail can also comprise cardinal matter. In the performance 'Before your dreams part you' it is the subject of freedom and order, fear of losses which come with every decision and also a little nostalgia for illimitability of youth ...

Roman Černík, TODAY (MF DNES) 18.4.2001





PROGRAMMA

Screenplay: Continuo Theatre

Music: Jan Brůček

Scenegraphy: Continuo Theatre

Director: Pavel Štourač

Cast: Gábina Berková, Perla Kotmelová, Helena Štouračová, Martin Bonne, Jan Brůček, Jiří Juráš, Libor Kubeš, Pavel Štourač, Leoš Vrána

Production: HAFAN STUDIO, Blanka Borůvková

First night: April 14th, 2001, Kašperk castle



(c) 2002 - Continuo Theatre