Kafka's Ape
Kafka’s Ape Promo with Howard Rosenstein as Redpeter
Captured on the Gold Coast and imprisoned in a cage, Redpeter's only escape route is to become a walking, talking, spitting, hard-drinking member of the Peace Industry, the entrepreneurial world of mercenary soldiers that is one of the biggest growth industries of the 21st century. In detailing the journey of his enforced evolution from Apedom to Humandom, Mr. Redpeter is a living embodiment of the irony that perhaps now he is more animal than he ever was as an Ape. All the photos are of Howard Rosenstein as Redpeter from the original productions.
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) is widely celebrated as one of the most important writers of the 20th century. Written during the darkest hours of the Great War, Kafka’s central thesis in his satire on forced assimilation – that other animals have a dignity and a respect for Mother Nature and their own species that Homo sapiens has lost – has here been nudged into modern day. From director Guy Sprung, “When Kafka first wrote this short story, millions of human beings were coerced into an orgy of killing each other, proving Homo sapiens to be vastly superior to gorillas and chimpanzees when it came to mass murder and genocide. Ironically, one of the largest of the private military corporations doing business with the American government today is called Academi, formerly known as Blackwater. The company is regularly in the headlines. In a sense, it still is a report for an Academy.” Queries Sprung, “Was Kafka able to see into the future?”
Performed over 150 times to critical acclaim, Kafka’s Ape is one of Infinithéâtre’s most successful plays, seen in Montreal, Toronto, New York, Stratford, Edinburgh, Beijing and Tokyo
The creative team behind Rosenstein’s transformation is Vladimir Alexandru Cara for the creature’s make-up design; original lighting designer Eric Mongerson; original sound and video designer Nikita U; and movement coaches Anana Rydvald and Zach Fraser.
Montreal, January 2019– Infinithéâtre’s is proudly taking its critically acclaimed Kafka’s Ape on tour, to Beijing China. Powerhouse Howard Rosenstein is riveting in adaptor/director Guy Sprung’s captivating play. This mesmerizing production plays September 3,4,5,6 at the Qinglan Theatre in central Beijing.
“I deliberately don’t use the word ‘freedom’. ‘Freedom’ is a powerfully seductive word which your so-called civilized world uses very cleverly, very effectively, to entrap and occupy whole continents.” – Redpeter
Based on Franz Kafka’s short story “A Report for an Academy” (1917) and adapted by Sprung from the original German, Kafka’s Apeupends the notion of civilization and what it means to be human in a world of routinized inhumanity. The show is an unnerving satire on ‘otherness’ and the compounding growth of private military companies. Fueled by bloodlust and alcohol, Rosenstein stars as keynote speaker and primate, Mr. Redpeter, in a theatrical tour-de-force performance. This classic tale of freedom, power and alienation is more current than ever.
Captured on the Gold Coast and imprisoned in a cage, Redpeter’s only escape route is to become a walking, talking, spitting, hard-drinking member of the ‘peace industry’; the entrepreneurial world of mercenary soldiers that is one of the biggest growth industries of the 21st century. In detailing the journey of his enforced evolution from apedom to humanhood, Mr. Redpeter is a living embodiment of the irony that perhaps now he is more animal than he ever was as an ape. Witness a human become an ape become a human before your very eyes…
Kafka’s Ape in Beijing
Texte…
Reviews
-
Hard Work and Obedience Will set You Free.
The Bain St. Michel has been transformed into a conference room at the Hyatt. There are fancy LED footlights and black velvet backdrops and massive corporate banners and a chandelier of balloons.
-
The Charlebois Post
Where Infinitheatre’s take on the tale differs, is that rather than becoming a seasoned performer for the entertainment of people as in Kafka’s story, Red Peter was captured and trained to be a special operative for a large corporate security firm.
-
Kafka’s Ape modernizes classic story
MONTREAL- When a human meets a gorilla or a chimpanzee, there’s inevitalibly a shock of recognition. Perhaps on both sides.
-
Kafka’s Ape reinvents classic short story
When a human meets a gorilla or a chimpanzee, there’s inevitably a shock of recognition. Perhaps on both sides. Franz Kafka took the kinship of man and ape seriously in his short story A Report to an Academy, published in 1917.
-
Infinithéâtre connecting with audiences despite the dark
What can you do to keep a theatre going after all public venues shut down to guard against the spread of COVID-19? So asked Infinithéâtre artistic director and founder last March.
