For a quick view of the live performance, please click the link below.
Duration: 12:25m
“This is a show about borders.
This is a show about borders which become saturated and overflow.
This is a show about borders which became saturated, overflow and enter bodies.
This is a show about bodies. This is a show about bodies heading against the wall.
And then, they die.”
Maria Sequeira Mendes in Pastoral, Book of Texts
Heading Against the Wall, is a theatre piece by Cão Solteiro made in collaboration with the film maker André Godinho and the actor Greg Wohead comprising two different objects – one presented live at the main room in Lux club, in Lisbon; and the other broadcast simultaneously on the internet.
The piece’s structure relies on a series of personal questions, randomly picked by the actors, and answered in real time. The viewer doesn´t hear the questions, only the answers.
Questions and answers diverge in each presentation, as they approach themes such as intimacy and the simultaneously true and false exposure of identity and private space on the internet.
In the live version, three actors roam freely through the space, continuously changing a series of uncomfortable clothes.
On the internet, spectators watch an assemblage of live inserts and pre-recorded images of the actors wandering through the city.
The reading of a report on a scientific study of clothing sweat absorption spans both versions.
Cão Solteiro is a platform of artists creating works of theatre in Lisbon since 1997, directed by actor Paula Sá Nogueira, costume designer Mariana Sá Nogueira, and producer/photographer Joana Dilão. Their creative process relies on the construction of images, and their work often code-switches between different artistic languages and disciplines. They continually question the formal relevance of theatre and test its structural rules, focusing mainly on how communication establishes itself and unfolds in the theatre.
Their tools include the displacement and purposeful misuse of formal elements and of meaning, absurd entrances, errors, and pure lies.
Cão Solteiro creates projects in colaboration with the film maker André Godinho since 2007.
Heading Against The Wall is the first artistic colaboration with the actor Greg Wohead
Creation Cão Solteiro & André Godinho
Scenography Vasco Araújo
Costume Design Mariana Sá Nogueira
Sewing Mestra Teresa Louro, Mestra Rosário Balbi
Sound Design Emídio Buchinho
Light Design Joana Mário
Production Mariana Sá Marques
Stage Manager/Cão Solteiro Noëlle Georg
Production Director and Photography Joana Dilão
Sound Recording Studio Estúdio da Maternidade
Actors Cecília Henriques, Greg Wohead, Paula Sá Nogueira
Voz-Off – António Gouveia
ONLINE VERSION
Director and Editor André Godinho
Sound Emídio Buchinho
Sound Recording Studio Estúdios Namouche
Streaming Bitmood
Book of Texts Maria Sequeira Mendes, Nuno Fonseca, Pedro Faro
Book of Images Mariana Sá Nogueira
Translations Susana Pomba
Scenography Intern Sara Vicente (Mestrado em Teatro/ Escola Superior de Teatro e Cinema)
Theatre Intern Mansy Singh and Sofia Silva (Curso Profissional de Artes do Espectáculo/Escola Básica e Secundária Passos Manuel)
Support São Luiz Teatro Municipal, Teatro Praga and Junta de Freguesia da Misericórdia
Co-Production Cão Solteiro, TBA-Teatro do Bairro Alto, Festival Alkantara 2020
Financial Support República Portuguesa | Cultura, Direcção Geral das Artes and Câmara Municipal de Lisboa
Acknowledgements André e. Teodósio, Bazar do Vídeo, Equipa do LuxFrágil, Filipe Sambado, Joaquim Montes – Estúdios Namouche and Teatro Praga
This was the first in-person show I’ve seen that was not only made during the pandemic but collected and distilled something of what it’s been like these past months. Not that covid is ever mentioned – most of the temporal references are mysteriously to 2008 – but there is a longing for intimacy, a preposterous oversharing that somehow befits these days of Zoom and precarity.
As is often the case in the work of Cão Solteiro, totality is out of reach: at home or in the same space as the performers, you won’t get the whole show, which is unceremoniously decentred (until the very end): performers stand next to distant windows or behind pillars, are filmed with their backs turned to the camera, answer questions we don’t hear. It’s all part of the game.
Cão Solteiro tend do come up with rules that make life difficult for them, but this time the pandemic (gamemaster, game changer, adversary) did that for them. There’s a sense of defiance and one-upmanship in the way they play: as the stories get increasingly surreal and intertwined, as bodies are mangled and split, a special lyricism appears. Perhaps it’s love. Or hope.
Francisco Frazão
CONTACTS
Cão Solteiro . teatro
Joana Dilão +351 919306875
caosolteiro@gmail.com
Website
www.caosolteiro.com
Mickael de Oliveira was born in France, in 1984, and has lived in Portugal since 1999. In 2013, he got his Ph.D. in contemporary Portuguese and European dramaturgy from the School of Humanities – University of Lisbon, where he is post-doctoral fellow researching the presence of literature in contemporary theatre and dance. In 2008, Mickael founded Colectivo 84, the theatre company for which he develops playwriting and directing projects. His work O que é teu entregou aos mortais was distinguished with the Maria Matos New Playwriting Award (Maria Matos Municipal Theatre, 2007), and Clytemnestra received an Honorable Mention – António José da Silva Prize (D. Maria II National Theatre, Lisbon / FUNARTE, Brazil, 2012). Some of his most recent productions include Oslo–Fuck Them All and Everything Will Be Wonderful (co-created with Nuno M Cardoso, Gil Vicente Academic Theatre, São Luiz Municipal Theatre), The Constitution (2016, Dona Maria National Theatre), and the diptych Socrates Must Die (Socrates’ Death / The Life of John Smith, 2017/2018, Vila Flor Cultural Centre, São Luiz Municipal Theatre, Viriato Theatre, Gil Vicente Academic Theatre. Mickael has served as the artistic director of END – New Dramaturgy Encounters, a project that aims to foster new Portuguese and international playwriting (1st edition at the São Luiz Municipal Theatre, Lisbon, Nov. 2010; 2nd and 3rd editions at the Gil Vicente Academic Theatre, March, Coimbra, 2015/2019). He was Assistant Professor of Arts Administration and Artistic Studies at the School of Education and Humanities (Leiria), guest Lecturer at the School of Theatre and Film Studies (Lisbon), and guest Assistant Professor at the School of Humanities – University of Coimbra. From September 2011 to August 2015, Mickael was Assistant Artistic Director of the Gil Vicente Academic Theatre (Coimbra).
Patrícia Portela is a writer and performance maker born in 1974, living between Belgium and Portugal. She has a BA in set and costume design by the high school of theatre and cinema of Lisbon, a Masters of Arts in scenography and dramaturgy of space from the University of Utrecht and Saint Martins college of art in Antwerp, a post-graduation in theatricality and performativity from APT in Antwerp, a film stage at the European film school in Ebeltoft, Denmark, and a Masters in Philosophy of the University of Leuven, Belgium. Since 2003 she has worked on her own performances and installations in collaboration with international artists. She has achieved national and international recognition for her unusual work and is considered one of the most daring artists and innovative writers of her generation. She won the Revelation Prize in 1994 for her creative work in performance and cinema, the Prize Teatro na Década for T5 in 1999, the Gulbenkian Foundation Prize Madalena de Azeredo Perdigão for the performance Flatland I in 2004 and was one of the 5 finalists of the Sonae Media Art Prize 2015 with her installation Parasomnia, amongst other prizes. She has been invited to participate in the prestigious International Writing Program (IWP) at the University of Iowa in 2013 and to be the first Outreach Fellow. She was the first literary resident in Berlin in 2016, sponsored by the Portuguese Embassy in Germany/Instituto Camões. She lectures “dramaturgy and space” and “image” regularly at Universities and cultural centers in Portugal (such as University of Minho or University of Lisbon) and abroad (University of Antwerp, Escola de Escrita in Curitiba, etc). She is the author of several novels, short stories and performances, such as Dias úteis (2016, considered one of the books of the year by several reviewers) or Banquet (finalist at the Novel Prize of APE 2012). She is a chronicle writer for the prestigious Jornal de Letras since 2017 and for the National Radio Antena 1.
Rui Horta was one of the most influencial choreographers of his generation, his work being presented all over the world such as the Theatre de la Ville, that co-produced it for over a decade. He directed S.O.A.P. at the Mousonturm, and created for many companies such as NDT, Cullberg, Geneva, Gotemburg, etc. 
