BACK BY PUBLIC DEMAND
Work is the Curse of the Drinking Classes
Entertainment based on the Work of Oscar Wilde
Performed by Jeroen Kranenburg
Costume, props & décor Koos Marais
@ 6 Spin Street Restaurant-Theatre
6 Spin Street, Church Square, Cape Town.
Dates: Wed 19 – Fri 21 & Thur 27 – Sun 30 December.
3 course dinner & show 7pm (R240)
Reservation essential: 021 461 0666
Email:reservations@6spinstreet.co.za
“Apt wit of past century’s genius” – Tracey Saunders, Cape Times - 22 Nov 2012
Thanks to this wonderful review and ever growing public demand we are delighted to extent Work is the Curse of the Drinking Classes, performed by Jeroen Kranenburg in the last two weeks of December. This internationally acclaimed one-man entertainment combined with the exquisite cuisine on offer will provide the perfect night out during the festive season,
Paris 1899. “If another century began and I was still alive, I think it would be more than the English could stand!”
Oscar Wilde; we have only to hear the great name to anticipate that what will be quoted as his will surprise and delight us. This outrageous Irishman from Dublin (via Oxford) declared he was a socialist and hinted he was a homosexual while patently mocking wise saws an all subjects. He declined, in a public and ceremonious manner, to live within his means, behave modestly, respect his elders, or recognize such entities as nature and art in their traditional apparel.
He won admiration and denigration. Legends sprang up about him, and unsavory rumours too. He was accused of sins from effeminacy to plagiarism. That he was the kindest of men was not so widely known. Instead, at the very moment he was writing his best and The Importance of Being Earnest had crowned his career, what the law picturesquely calls sodomy was imputed to him. He was sentenced in the end to two years of hard labor for the lesser charge of indecent behavior with men. So much glory has rarely been followed by so much humiliation.
The hardships of prison life and of subsequent exile in France and Italy, left Wilde a broken man. A spendthrift on his uppers, slighted by old acquaintances, he pursued on his release the life for which he had been jailed. In 1900, at the age of 46, he died in an obscure Paris Hotel.
Wilde is one of us. His wit is an agent for renewal, as pertinent now as a hundred years ago. The questions posed by both his art and his life lend his art a quality of earnestness, an earnestness which he always disavowed.
This entertainment devised and performed by Jeroen Kranenburg pays tribute to Wilde’s critical sense, his wide and deep learning, and his profound humanity. The show also focuses on the cynicism with which friends cut him off at his fall; on literature, art and life in the 1890’s; his remarkable tour of America in 1882, and his subsequent success as a poet, journalist, critic and dramatist in London.
This production premiered in February 1986 at the Stalhouderij Theatre in Amsterdam. Since then, it has successfully toured to Berlin, New York, London, Market Theatre, Grahamstown National Arts Festival (1991 & 2003), Port Elizabeth, Hogsback, Witness Arts Festival, Olympia Café, Mount Nelson Hotel and Obz Café.
Work is the Curse of the Drinking Classes will be performed at 6 Spin Street Restaurant Theatre, 6 Spin Street, 6 Spin Street, Church Square, Cape Town. To make reservations please phone 021 461 0666 or per email reservations@6spinstreet.co.za
ABOUT JEROEN KRANENBURG
Jeroen Kranenburg was born in 1957 in Worcester and spent his early youth in De Doorns in the Cape. In 78 he graduated from UCT with a Performers Diploma in Speech and Drama and subsequently emigrated to the Netherlands for 18 years. He was artistic-director of Provadja Theatre in Alkmaar in North Holland for three years. In 83 he was guest director at the Dom Mladih Youth Theatre in Sarajevo. From 84 – 87 he joined Sheer Madness Fools Theatre working in 5 languages and performing on all major festivals on the continent. As free-lance performer he has worked with over 20 companies throughout Europe, giving workshops and directing. In 1995 he returned to Cape Town and has since worked on a variety of theatre productions, amongst others; Truth in Translation, Amadeus, Hamlet, Twaalfde Nag, Dancing at Lughnasa, As You Like It, Taming of the Shrew, Witnesses, Now Now, The Birds, Dis Nou te Laat and several one-man shows.
Issued by Linette de Kock
Marketing & PR
021 461 3746
082 224 1030