Theatre play

A man in a smoking jacket sits at a picked over dinner table with a white table cloth; the rest of the table seems to have already left. Moving from one chair to the next, the wonderful Jeroen Willems portrays five powerbrokers from our life and times: an intellectual, an entrepreneur, a criminal top executive, a clergyman and a board member of a large corporation.

»Searching for traces« – The piece »Twee stemmen« (»Two voices«) is more than 13 years old – and it has never been as contemporary as it is today. A brilliant-dialectic study of the abuse of power and its justification, it has been seen in every metropolis in Europe and has received numerous awards. Basis of this play are texts by the Italian film maker Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922-75) and a speech given by the real former CEO of Shell International Cor Herkströter.

Jeroen Willems, born in 1962 in Heerlen/Netherlands, completed his studies at the Toneelacademie Maastricht in 1987 and accepted his first role with the theatre group Hollandia in Amsterdam at the same time. He has performed in numerous pieces under the direction of Johan Simons as well as Christoph Marthaler. He has also appeared in many films since 1992.

Johan Simons, born in 1946 in Heerjansdam, is one of the most important directors in Europe. Alongside extensive directorial work in the Netherlands and at German-speaking theatres, he assumed the artistic directorship of NTGent in 2005 and assumed the artistic directorship of the Münchner Kammerspiele in the autumn of 2010.

»Willems is – as is as gradually becoming the consensus – one of the most extraordinary actors in Europe. While one has often seen a virtuoso jump from one role to the next at lightning speed, it has never been as decisive and implacable as it is here. Willems’ brilliance is a prerequisite, not the goal of the endeavour« (Renate Klett, DIE ZEIT, Hamburg, 15/2002).