HISTORY OF VIOLENCE ADELAIDE FESTIVAL 2026

 

 

History of Violence. Based on Histoire de la violence by Edouard Louis. 

Directed by Thomas Ostermeier.  Director Thomas Ostermeier. Collaboration Director David Stoehr. Set and costume design. Nina Wetzel. Composer Nils Ostendorf. Video Sebastian Dupouey. Dramaturg Florian Borchmeyer. Lighting designer. Michael Wetzel. Collaboration choreography Johanna Lemke. Coproduction with Theatre de la Ville ParisTheatre National Wallonie-Bruxelle and St Ann’s Warehouse Brooklyn. The Dunstan Playhouse. Adelaide Festival Centre. Adelaide Festival. February 7 – March 2 2026.

Cast: Christoph Gawenda. Laurenz Lufenberg. Renato Schuch. Alina Stiegler. Thomas Witte (Musician)

 Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

 

Laurenz Lufenberg as the policeman. Christoph Gawenda as Edouard. 

Renato Schuch as Reda in Histoire de la violence  

Audiences who remember Thomas Ostermeier’s politically charged production of Who Killed My Father (Qui a tue mon pere?) at the 2024 Adelaide Festival may have some idea of what to expect from his production based on Edouard Louis’s autobiographical novel Histoire de la violence. In the tradition of Shaubuhne Berlin Histoire de la violence is a shocking and compelling account of the brutal sexual assault of Louis by a stranger he met while returning home to his Paris apartment on Christmas Eve. What unfolds are a series of reenactments of the events from the flirtation on the street to the invitation to Edouard’s apartment, sex between them and a violent outburst when Edouard accuses the Algerian Reda of robbery.

Christoph Gawenda and Alina Stiegler as Clara in Histoire de la violence

Ostermeir is forensically clinical in his exploration of the themes of violence and identity. His is a bare bones investigation of the incident in an attempt to reach the truth. The play opens with Edouard Louis (Christoph Gawenda) seated at the back of the stage as a team of forensic investigators enter to mark out the scene for evidence and fingerprints. On the screen at the rear a video of a naked man writhes on the floor. Edouard moves forward to a microphone and a raw and urgent retelling of the experience bursts forth, urgent, breathless and echoing with terror. Percussionist Thomas Witte accompanies the tense recounting of the horror of the scene. 

Edouard Gawenda and Renato Schuch as Reda in Histoire de la violence

The account is gripping, forecasting the violence that is about to erupt as Reda (Renato Schuch} twists the scarf about Edouard’s throat in an act of fury. And yet there are no clear answers to the conundrum. How does one explain the blood that is on the bed and the floor? Has Reda carried out his threat of murder? Does he strangle Edouard or does he shoot him) Or neither? We are left with a veil of ambiguity which clouds reality. Is Eduard’s account to his sister Clara (Alina Stiegler) an accurate retelling of the sequence of events? Is Clara’s retelling to her husband (Laurenz Lufenberg) a distortion? The characters become witnesses to the event and incidentally interpreters of truth. Clara’s view of the story is informed by her attitude towards her homosexual brother. The police are dictated to by procedure and prejudice towards North Africans. Cara and Eduoard are influenced by the depressed mother, forced to work in a menial and punishing job. Reda finds justification in the criminal past of his father and grandfather. The doctor’s disinterest is expressed in her disregard for Edouard’s condition as she finishes her hand of solitaire. The truth changes as each character creates their own reality. 

Renato Schuch as Reda in Histoire de la violence

Ostermeier is the master of alienation or what Brecht termed das Verfremdungseffekt. The direction is sharply anatomical and analytical.  The characters speak through microphones at times to tell their account or heighten the drama of the moment. Video is used to embellish the visceral effect of the sexual intimacy and the escalating violence. At times the actors break into a dance routine as a mockery of the seriousness of the situation. There is comical pathos in the caricature of the mother or the indifference of Clara’s boring husband. In Ostermeier’s production the history of any violence is a complex account of many truths,  depending on the character and motives of the teller. It is what gives this production power. There is not a murmer in the audience, gripped by the complexity of their own perspective. What is the truth and how can we change it? We are left with the force of our imagination to alter reality which is what Edouard does whether speaking to his sister, the police or the hospital staff or the audience.

 Ostermeier’s cast is superb. Gawenda and Schuch play Louis and Reda while the other actors change roles,  each creating a totally different and believable character. Ostermeier directs his outstanding ensemble with precision in a production that is at times suspenseful, searingly tense, humourous and intellectually demanding. Ostermeier and his Shaubuhne Berlin company once again confirm their place as theatre provocateurs. History of Violence is the kind of theatre that merits its place as a highlight of this year’s Adelaide Festival. Audiences will remain intrigued and provoked by the work long after they have left this extraordinary work.

Photos by Arno Declair 

  

BEDROOM FARCE

Written by Alan Ayckbourn

Directed by Aarne Neeme

Canberra Repertory

Canberra Rep Theatre Feb 19 - March 7

 

Reviewed by Alanna McLean

 

Alan Ayckbourn’s Bedroom Farce is old now, having all the marks of the 1970s about it as the older generation wrestle with hippies and the new age ideas of the young and everyone wrestles with old fashioned fixed phones. But in the expertly sensitive hands of director Aarne Neeme and a strong cast it still has quite a bit to say about marriage and relationships.

There’s three bedrooms onstage and the action swaps backwards and forwards among them. Firstly, there’s older couple, Delia (Sally Rynveld) and Ernest (Pat Gallagher), set in their ways, observing little domestic rituals, the parents of Trevor (James Grudnoff), an awfully immature hippy of a son who is paired with the very highly strung Susannah (Lara Connolly).

Malcolm (Lachlan Abrahams) and Kate (Antonia Kitzel) are a younger and more good-humoured pair but Malcolm’s doggedly unsuccessful approach to furniture building may be the big upset.

And the patience of Jan (Azerie Cromhout) is tensely coping with a bed bound Nick (Rob de Fries) because of his injured back. That’s a nice device for an actor and de Fries takes full advantage of the opportunities for comedy.

There are only three bedrooms on stage but four couples and it is Trevor and Susannah who provide much of the action in their self-absorbed wanderings between the three. These two take over each bedroom with their problems regardless of any sense of tact.

It’s a play that calls for (and receives) skilled teamwork as the action switches back and forth between those bedrooms, subtly differentiated by Andrew Kay’s straightforward set.

Ayckbourn’s plays are deceptive in that they seem on the surface to be just domestic comedy, but they always contain a character or two who is so disturbingly insensitive that you could shake them. Here it would be Trevor and Susannah, always invading others’ space, never noticing the effect they have on others.

Funny but with an edge of bleakness, this production is a reminder of the niggling power of a playwright who knows what he is doing.

A good night out with Ayckbourn and Canberra Rep and Aarne Neeme.

 

 

NEVER CLOSER

Written by Grace Chapple

Directed by Lachlan Houen.

Off the Ledge Theatre

Courtyard Studio, Canberra Theatre Centre. February 19-28.

 

Reviewed by Alanna McLean

 

Never Closer is a tightly written play set in Ireland.  At the beginning the Troubles are in full swing but the young Catholic characters are also concentrating on living life. Life moves on and they reunite but now one is partnered with an Englishman and tensions and violence arise. There’s an ending of sorts some years later that involves migration and return.

There’s strong playing all round, with Emily O’Mahoney setting the pace as the fierce Deirdre who stays in the family home while others move away.  Breanna Kelly as Mary is properly forthright as the young woman who calls a spade a spade. Natasha Lyall has a lovely knowing dignity as the one who comes back with an English partner. This is the wonderfully out of his cultural depth Harry who is deftly caught by Pippin Carroll. 

Joel Hrbek’s playing of the perceptive Jimmy is an insightful contrast to Conor (a disturbing portrayal by Nick Bisa), a young man who seems to have absorbed all of the devastating local history with an eye to continuing it.

Set and lighting have some good atmospheric moments and there’s a poetic transformation done by the cast late in the piece which makes one wonder why an earlier set dressing change is not done in the same way.

The ending feels oddly underdeveloped but there’s a power in the people and a great feeling for dialogue. There’s real strength in the interaction between the characters and the use of the history. And the playing is of a very high order. It was well worth a visit to the Courtyard to see this cast at work on what is a powerful recent piece of Australian writing.

 

STRAVINSKY, SCHUBERT AND BEETHOVEN - MASTERPIECES FOR VIOLIN AND PIANO

 

Jimmy Park, violin

Alexander Yau, piano

Wesley Music Centre, Forrest, February 28

 

 

Reviewed by Len Power

 

Showcasing masterpieces that embody the notion of a duo proved to be a very good idea for this pair of musicians, one on piano and the other on violin. They showed beyond doubt that they can play as one with three distinctive works by Stravinsky, Schubert and Beethoven.

Returning home for this special performance, Jimmy Park (violin) is currently undertaking post-master’s studies at the Mozarteum University in Salzburg. Alexander Yau, a Juilliard School graduate, is currently Associate Lecturer at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.

They commenced their program with Igor Stravinsky’s Divertimento, originally written for the ballet in 1928 and arranged for violin and piano in 1932. This work is colourful, rhythmic and playful with an underlying tension. Yau and Park gave it a fine performance, clearly bringing out all the distinct characteristics of Stravinsky’s work.

The next item was Franz Schubert’s 1826 Rondo in B minor. This work is both highly energetic as well as lyrical, challenging players both technically and interpretively. Their performance was exciting and well-controlled throughout.

Jimmy Park, violin and Alexander Yau, piano

The final work of the program was Ludwig van Beethoven’s 1803 Sonata No. 9 in A – the Kreuzer.  This major work in three movements has a reputation for technical difficulty in performance, requiring the ability to achieve a wide range of emotion in the music. The performers met that challenge superbly, especially with their electrifying playing of the exuberant third movement.

These works may have tested the performers, but both appeared relaxed and you could sense that they were thoroughly enjoying playing together.

To end this concert of highly emotional music, the performers gave a calming encore of the sweetly romantic Liebeslied by Fritz Kreisler.

 

Photos by Dalice Trost

 

This review was first published by Canberra CityNews digital edition on 1 March 2026.

Len Power's reviews are also broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 in the ‘Arts Cafe’ and ‘Arts About’ programs and published in his blog 'Just Power Writing' at https://justpowerwriting.blogspot.com/.