Presented in association with The Library Theatre Company.
To mark the 400th anniversary of the invention of opera, Faulty Optic and Mira Calix re-invent one of the great myths in a visual and sonic feast.
Eurydice dies tragically on her wedding day but Orpheus, her fiancée, bargains to bring her back from the Land of the Dead.
Greedy to gaze upon his bride once more, Orpheus breaks the deal he has made with Pluto, the god of Hades, and Eurydice is lost forever. Orpheus’ moans of anguish enrage the once friendly Bacchae, who rip him to shreds before throwing his dismembered body into the river where his head can still be heard singing.
Orpheus has found most of his strewn body parts except his legs. But he finds himself in Hades and of course … he’s dead.
If he remarries Eurydice underground, all will be fine; they will be together for eternity. But she has a more pressing task as she desperately tries to wash something terrible away. Slowly her faltering memories start to corrode as the ferryman churns up the filthy waters sending ripples throughout the whole of the Underworld.
In Dead Wedding, cult puppetry company Faulty Optic and contemporary composer Mira Calix go underground to pick up the tale where the ancient myth ends. With Faulty’s macabre humour, and Calix’s subterranean soundworlds, Dead Wedding uses puppets, film, laptop, live musicians and strangely distorted voices to re-mix the Orpheus tale for the 21st century.
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