Het Gelukzalige (Blissful Souls) is about a business partnership between pickpockets, two women and three men. Every morning they spread out over the city, returning only in the evening to hand over the spoils of the day to Brouwer, an elderly woman who no longer ‘works’ herself, but rules the partnership with an iron rod. She ensures that the takings are shared out equally and even after work she keeps a close eye on everyone to prevent relationships forming within the enterprise. Group sex, mating with a dog or a fish, Brouwer doesn’t have a problem with anything like that, but love is undesirable.
After the resounding success of the Flemish-Dutch coproduction Bij het kanaal naar links (Turn Left at the Canal, 2011) created jointly by Olympique Dramatique and the Dutch theatre and film-maker Alex van Warmerdam, there was little doubt that that would not be the end of their cooperation. The production Bij het kanaal naar links – which proved worthy of selection for the Dutch Theatre Festival – also underlined the common ground shared by Van Warmerdam and the members of Olympique Dramatique: they all have a great love of the ordinary – of ordinary people like you and me – but in their hands that ordinariness is always dealt a blow, it derails and the dark motives for our actions rise to the surface. Nothing human surprises us…
The ties between the two parties have been further strengthened by Alex van Warmerdam’s films: Tom Dewispelaere appeared in the film Borgman (2013), and he took on one of the lead roles in Schneider vs. Bax, a film by Van Warmerdam (2015). Van Warmerdam has now written a text for this new production with Olympique Dramatique, which is being staged in the large auditoria of Dutch and Belgian theatres.
by
- Olympique Dramatique
- De Mexicaanse Hond
text, director, music
- Alex van Warmerdam
performance
- Annet Malherbe
- Eva van de Wijdeven
- Tom Dewispelaere
- Geert Van Rampelberg
- Eva van der Post
- Ben Segers
light design
- Stefan Dijkman
sound effects and audio mixing
- Robert van Delft
costume design
- Karen De Wolf
production
- Toneelhuis
coproduction
- Orkater
- Toneelhuis
