Ingenting er ingenting* (Nothing is nothing)

At the webpage of The National Theatre the following, among other things, is written about Ingenting er ingenting* (Nothing is nothing):

"I am 76 years old, and I think a lot about aging, confusion and death. I am about to enter that foreign land, and here are some stories from it…

This is how actress Thea Stabell opens her production Ingenting er ingenting (the quote is translated from the Norwegian by Sceneweb). Stabell stands alone onstage, intertwining two stories: One is about the 83-year-old Jorunn Marie Bukkøy, who at 7 a.m. March 1 2010 was found in the snow, in a bed of roses outside the building where she lived in Oslo. The other is about a confident, uncontrolled king and a naïve earl - from the world literature's perhaps greatest work about aging, Shakespeare's King Lear.

The stories of the three old ones are in many ways terrible. But can new emotions and new insight be found when the stories are intertwined and told? When they are shared with other living persons breathing in the same room as the narrator, can one then see aging as liberating, as spiritual, as something beautiful? Can these stories even become surprising and vitalising? This is the aim of Thea Stabell.

In our modern days we fear the process of aging. 'I'm gonna take my fear and wear it like a crown', sings Rebekka Karijord. This thought has been a springboard for the work with the production."

The production is supported by Arts Council Norway, the freedom of expression foundation Fritt Ord and Norwegian Health Association.

SOURCE:

The National Theatre, www.nationaltheatret.no, 11.06.2015, http://www.nationaltheatret.no/Ingenting+er+ingenting.b7C_wRvY5M.ips

*Not yet translated into the English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.