Klassebilde* (Yearbook Photo)
Klassebilde* (Yearbook Photo) (1978) was the third theatre production by Perleporten Teatergruppe. Klassebilde was developed by the actors in collaboration. After the reviewers' response in the Oslo newspapers, there was a discussion about theatre criticism in the same newspapers. See more below and in the multimedia box.
Information
(Objekt ID 8864)| Object type | Production |
| Premiere | February 1, 1978 |
| Produced by | Perleporten Teatergruppe |
| Audience | Adults, Youth |
| Language | Norwegian |
| Keywords | Theatre, Political Theatre |
| Running period | February 1, 1978 — April 8, 1978 |
| Name | Role |
|---|---|
| Runar Bakken | – Script |
| Birgit Christensen | – Script |
| Karl Hoff | – Script |
| Helge Braanen | – Stage design |
| Sven Erik Haug | – Stage design |
| Helge Braanen | – Costume |
| Runar Bakken | – Actor |
| Karin Benan | – Actor |
| Birgit Christensen | – Actor |
| Karl Hoff | – Actor |
| Christian Eggen | – Musician (På forestillingene på ABC Teatret i Oslo) |
| Per-Bjarne Johnsen | – Voiceover (Karl Marx - på telefon) |
| Maja Lise Rønneberg Rygg | – Voiceover (På lydbånd) |
| Kjell Vesje | – Voiceover (På lydbånd) |
| Per-Bjarne Johnsen | – Director’s assistant |
"The way I experience the performance, this is because the company has come to cultivate its distinct quality to way too high a degree. It surely is unique, and in its hushed suggestion power onstage it did not fail to have an effect on a small and in part very young audience at the cinema Panorama: We felt we were in the presence of a company whose artistic flame burned purely and clearly. But for now it had no warmth.
Had it become too pure? - The theatre is a vulgar place. People should be able to walk in from the street to understand what is going on. Brecht knew and could let his noisy whims make way for the poetical, the way Hålogaland Theatre demonstrated with its Chalk Circle in Tromsø this weekend.
Klassebilde* (Yearbook Photo) - a text Perleporten has collectively committed - is what I must label the theatrical counterpoint to the performance at Hålogaland Theatre. There is something symbolic in the fact that Klassebilde opens with Bach - a Brandenburg concerto they play. – That means, obviously, that they do not play it. The music is recorded, but three of them make playing movements. One conducts. Then the music stops. - We can't play, says Karl Hoff, as you can see...
A fated opening line, one could say, if it hadn't been without reason: Hoff, Karin Benan, Birgit Christensen and Runar Bakken can play. (In Norwegian, playing and acting is the same word, spille. Sceneweb's comment.) We knew that already. Let it be that the acting style in this production at certain passages can be painted so broadly it becomes artificial - we can still see they know how. I think "why" is what they have lost sight of."
"[...] They have created life and movement in the words here too, often more conscious life than we experience in the institutional theatres, not at all frozen in an earlier shape. Some scenes are liberatingly funny. The ideas are many, and several of them good; a revealing little sigh to the main point, too: Imagine if everyone said what they wanted to say. It wouldn't work. It wouldn't work in another community, and not in this community.
The four persons are not happy, they see their own situation. The hints are enough to sense the tragedy of the policeman seeking security, the unsatisfied in the female teacher who only must think what others have thought before her, the porter who dreams of playing an actor, the PR woman who can't get enough of experiences. Really, they all have their freedom, one of the few things they have in common. But are they able to use it?
[...] The four performers were highly energetic and scored high on eagerness alone. Not that it should be tamed, it is half the charm; there is hardly a company in this country more enthusiastic about its theatre, though the members can barely make a living. Alone they do everything an otherwise large staff work on, at ABC-teatret (The ABC Theatre) they discuss with the audience for as long as the audience can take it, and afterwards they personally clean the theatre. Up early the next morning to sell tickets. That is what one calls guts, and there is no doubt it infects the audience too."
Christian Vennerød, JA (literally: YES), date unknown, Gateavisa [Oslo]:
""2 and 2 make four - or isn't it so, I wonder??" as a question to oneself is how Perleporten opens the play Klassebilde, recently opened. It is more Perleportian than ever. And the spectator is forced to question himself/herself during the performance: What is true and what is a lie? What is a dream and what is reality? Can we live in this reality - or just exist? What can I do to change reality?"
Lasse Tømte, NO (literally: NO), date unknown, Gateavisa [Oslo]:
"Perleporten Teatergruppe has two splendidly clear, excellent productions behind this one. In addition the company has been an innovator for the Anarchist theatre and the Anarchist life style. When a new production is announced one is permitted to meet it with expectations. The opening at the cinema Eidsvold kino of Klassebilde did not meet the expectations. It was embarrassing, banal, without joy, obscuring - really just worth shrugging one's shoulder over. Everyone can fail once in a while, without being shot for it."
"That is why a lot seems to indicate that Perleporten should seek emergency aid in an able writer who can give dramatic life to what the company is so eager to say. It can't be hard to find an alliance with an instructor whose talent is transferring opinions from paper to stage - or a sense of discipline and development of actors. If that doesn't happen, much indicates that Perleporten will learn, in a rather brutal manner, that "100% of democracy" is nonsense when it comes to theatre - and that "the talent" exists."
Trond Hannemyr, date unknown, Telemark Arbeiderblad:
"The play took place in a hotel reception, not a madhouse, the way the hotel host Karl Hoff expressed it. As such we always make clear the frames of what is allowed and not. We stick to the security there is in living in relation to the image put up in front of us, live the life the community around us makes the frames for, and defines us within [...] like all the rest of us all these people were alienated, they were filled with fear of saying anything real, for so to be confronted with their own problem through others. At this point the text was genius. All the way it underlined this fear, indirectly, through wordplay and connotations."
Gunvald Opstad, date unknown, Fædrelandsvennen:
"An intellectual game it is, one that makes demands to the co-creating abilities of the audience. Exclusive, some might call it. For the audience claiming epic drama the production is not to be recommended. But for those used to modern drama, or the newest generation of poetry, for that sake, this will be a grand experience. Under any definition it is a young and rebellious performance."
Helge Vidar Holm, 20.02.1978, Bergens Tidende [Bergen]:
"Bryggen Museum is the place this week, for whoever wants to experience unconventional theatre, performed without public support, but no less professional for that reason. Of the independent theatre companies we have in this country, Perleporten is clearly in the forefront. The four actors, who are also a collective responsible for script and instruction, know their profession. If one is to put a label on the enterprise of Perleporten, one could say that they work in political theatre. But the way this term is usually understood, it is far too narrow to cover the acting style of this company. Of course the title of the play has a political meaning, but at the same time it refers to a very specific yearbook image - a photo of a school class - one that regularly appears in the performance, and which the different performers look at as a memory from their past, a childhood they once had. All of the persons in Klassebilde are out of touch with the world they live in. [...] central is, all the time, the question if the perception of reality is real or false."
Jo Ørjasæter, date unknown, Nationen [Oslo]:
"The play is based on everyday problems, meaningless being. Work that is not creative. We agree: The alienation is expansive - and one of the worst, most scary results of capitalism. [...] The most important part of Klassebilde is showing that we have the opportunities, that freedom is there, - but that we need to grab hold of it. Don't wait to go see this innovative theatre company."
*Not yet translated into English. The title within parentheses is the Norwegian title's literal meaning.