The Ventriloquists Convention

Split Personality

Disturbing, mysterious, unsettling. The Ventriloquists Convention is a shock that packs a punch. Gisèle Vienne revisits the annual international convention of ventriloquists she had attended in Kentucky in this almost documentary re-enactment where nine ventriloquists and their collection of miscellaneous marionettes indulge in strange rites, transforming reality into a strange fable. Just who is taking part in this annual gathering of ventriloquists, the puppeteer or the puppet?

After Jerk, the French-Austrian artist joined forces with Dennis Cooper and Jonathan Capdevielle to create this clever game of duality and dissociation where what’s true and what’s false merge together. This extraordinary artist, director and choreographer toys with the twists and turns of the psyche and human neuroses in this hyper-realistic fiction. Her orchestration and her puppetry are astounding, as is the skill of the puppeteers from Puppentheater Halle of Germany who incarnate this motley, touching group of humans. At times comical, often icy, this dissonant piece probes the souls of the living and the missing. Subversive.

Produced by D.A.C.M. + Puppentheater Halle
Created and directed by Gisèle Vienne
Written by Dennis Cooper in association with Performers
Co-created and performed by Jonathan Capdevielle + Kerstin Daley-Baradel + Uta Gebert + Vincent Göhre + the performers of Puppentheater Halle including Nils Dreschke + Sebastian Fortak + Lars Frank + Ines Heinrich-Frank + Katharina Kummer
Lighting design Patrick Riou
Music KTL – aka Stephen O’Malley + Peter Rehberg

Co-produced by Nanterre-Amandiers – Centre dramatique national + Festival d’Automne à Paris + Les Spectacles Vivants – Centre Pompidou + Centre dramatique national Orléans – Loiret / Centre + Le TJP – Centre dramatique national d’Alsace – Strasbourg + Maillon – Théâtre de Strasbourg – Scène européenne + La Bâtie – Festival de Genève + Internationales Sommerfestival – Kampnagel (Hamburg) + Kaserne Basel + Le Parvis – Scène nationale de Tarbes Pyrénées + Theater Freiburg + Bonlieu – Scène nationale Annecy through the project DIPTIC supported by the European Territorial Cooperation programme INTERREG V-A France-Suisse 2014-2020 + humainTROPhumain Centre dramatique national de Montpellier + Fidena Festival (Bochum)

With the support of Kulturstiftung des Bundes (Halle) + Pro Halle e.V. + Saalesparkasse (Halle) + Fachausschuss Tanz und Theater Basel-Stadt – Basel-Landschaft + Institut Français through the program Théâtre export + Bureau théâtre et danse – Institut Français d’Allemagne + Association Beaumarchais-SACD Paris through Programme d’aide à la production + Services Culturels de l’Ambassade de France à New-York 

Presented with the support of Institut français + Service de coopération et d’action culturelle du Consulat général de France à Québec in association with Goethe-Institut Montréal

Premiered at International Summer Festival, Hamburg, August 14, 2015