Can You Tell the Story of Romeo and Juliet?
Can You Tell the Story of Romeo and Juliet?
Gurur Ertem interviews Kelly Copper of Nature Theater of Oklahoma.
With their humorous reinvention of Romeo and Juliet, The New York based theater troupe Nature Theater of Oklahoma picks up from the last edition of iDANS which explored temporality in the arts, and brings us to the festival’s current focus. The work will be performed on October 10th and 11th atIstanbul State Theater’s Tekel Stage in Uskudar at 20:30.
In this delightful remake/retake of a classic on love which reintroduces theater an imaginative and dynamic concept of text, Nature Theater of Oklahoma displays a theater of theatrics, an interpretation of an interpretation, inquiring into the narrative construction of life, love, and the self as well as exposing the creativity involved in lightening up the blind alleys of memory.
Kelly Copper, who directs the company with her partner Pavol Liska, answers my questions concerning the trajectory of their career and their art.
I had seen Martine Pisani’s work sans in New York for the first time as part of the 2006/2007 program called “Fused” (French U.S Exchange in Dance). I remember that the whole audience, including the legendary ballet dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov, laughed into tears. It is difficult if not impossible to translate verbal jokes, jokes based on language. In a way, they set one group apart from another. A joke tried to be told in a different language is no longer funny. However, bodily humor can travel more easily and is more accessible.sans is one of the best examples to the connectivity of bodily humor.


