Trost i taklampa* (Blackbird in the Chandelier)
Trost i taklampa* (Blackbird in the Ceiling Lamp) is a theatre production by Prøysenfestivalen/Prøysenspelet (literally: The Prøysen Festival/The Prøysen Spectacle), produced in 2014 and based on the novel by Alf Prøysen. The new theatre adaption was made by Marie Hafting.
Morten Joachim directed it.
The production was performed as an outdoors performance at Prøysentunet in Ringsaker, between Prøysenstua, the cabin in which Alf Prøysen was born and grew up, and Prøysenhuset, the newly opened national culture centre dedicated to Alf Prøysen's life and work. The opening took place July 23 2014, 100 years to the day after the birth of Alf Prøysen.
*Not yet translated into the English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.
Information
(Objekt ID 41058)| Object type | Production |
| Premiere | July 23, 2014 |
| Produced by | Prøysenfestivalen |
| In collaboration with | Prøysenhuset |
| Based on | Trost i taklampa* (Blackbird in the Chandelier) by Alf Prøysen |
| Audience | Adults |
| Language | Norwegian dialect |
| Keywords | Theatre, Drama |
| Running period | July 23, 2014 |
"The festival's Prøysen productions always have aimed to dive down into Prøysen's writings and depict human destinies rather than to entertain. To stage Trost i taklampa as a revue has never been on the agenda, but and honest wish to make a theatre production in the spirit of the writer has always been there. But it is a formidable task, and the thought had to ripen through time. The aim is to give the audience a theatre version that is fresh as well as musical, knife-sharp, sore and funny at the same time."
In the printed program for Trost i taklampa the following, among other things, was written:
"Welcome to the Prøysen spectacle 2014! This is the eight production since we began to create summer theatre based on Alf Prøysen's prose universe.
(...)
Throughout all these years Trost i taklampa has hung in the horizon in front of us, as a scary challenge we knew had to come. Now the time has come. Alf would have turned 100 years and we are so lucky to be allowed to interpret his major work. Our aim with the work is to present the novel with fresh eyes and unafraid will to create."
Trost i taklampa (which has not been translated into the English) was the only novel Alf Prøysen wrote. The plot describes the reception a crofter's daughter (Gunvor), an orphanage boy (Arne) and a poet (Lundjordet) get, when they all return to the same home village for their summer vacations.
SOURCES:
Performance program Trost i taklampa, Prøysenspelet 2014.
Program Prøysenfestivalen 2014, http://www.proysenfestivalen.no/2014/07/27/trost-i-taklampa-arets-proysenspel/
*Not yet translated into the English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.
| Name | Role |
|---|---|
| Alf Prøysen | – Author |
| Marie Hafting | – Dramatised by |
| Morten Joachim | – Direction |
| Martha Standal | – Choreography |
| Frode Berntzen | – Musical direction |
| Mari Hesjedal | – Stage design |
| Ole Christian Gullvåg | – Actor (Handelsbetjenten m.fl) |
| Sven Henriksen | – Actor (Lundjordet) |
| Ida Løken Valkeapää | – Actor (Elise m.fl) |
| Kjærsti Odden Skjeldal | – Actor (Gunvor) |
| Mads Henning Skar-Jørgensen | – Actor (Brekkestøl) |
| Ane Skumsvoll | – Actor (Ingebjørg) |
| Tom Styve | – Actor (Hjalmar m.fl.) |
| Jacob Vigeland | – Actor (Arne) |
| Ane Skumsvoll | – Director’s assistant |
| Ingvill Fossheim | – Assistant Stage Designer |
| Mari Hesjedal | – Producer |
| Morten Joachim | – Producer |
| July 23, 2014 18:00 | Opening night |
"If the ideal is being earthbound, what happens to the one who dreams of flying? 'They were in touch with the earth'. This is one of the first lines in Marie Hafting/Morten Joachim's Trost i taklampa* (Blackbird in the Chandelier), and it is a key line. It divides 'us' and 'them', the small folks and the talking heads, and it shows how easy it is to be pompous on the behalf of others. Through quick cartoons and role depictions clear as types, characters and community are established. Deep issues relating to class, control and identity are threated to deceptively merry scenes. Marie Hafting's playscript and Morten Joachim's direction has placed the story close to popular comedy, and individual scenes flirt with parody. Serious sides exist, in the production, but they are often camouflaged. (...) Gunvor (Kjærsti Odden Skjeldal) knows the shadows. Raised in a crofter's cabin she can never get enough of light or colours. But Gunvor, who has the nickname 'the gaping blackbird', who dreams of being a lark and a prey decoy, will discover that not every duckling turns into a swan."
"In 2006 some of the people behind the theatre company Soria Laboratoria established a collaboration with Prøysenfestivalen in making a theatre production based on Prøysen's short stories. Rather than staging the same spectacle year after year, they quickly decided that the text material was so expansive that they had to write a new piece every year. (...) To make good dramaturgy out of something as many-faceted is no easy task. Hafting, Joachim and Skumsvoll have approached the work with a kind of humble disrespect. The foundation is made up of all those familiar characters, such as Gunvor Smikkstugun, the poet Lundjordet and the Snekkersve guys, but the presentation has been subject to a fair deal of rowdiness. (...) The performance is presented as a series of tableaus making it a bit fragmentary, and in which many of the repetitions could have been tightened. As usual the ensemble is a good mix of professionals and local amateurs in which Kjærsti Odden Skjeldal succeeds in conveying the somewhat naïve Gunvor who in her disappointed meeting with the home village ends up with a wish for revenge."
*Not yet translated into the English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.