Als Gekken
May 22nd, 2009
Last Wednesday I saw what is to be my last show this season at the LAK theater. And a great show to end this good season with! Laura van Oldron’s experiment was loosely based on Lars Von Trier’s The Idiots. She sat on stage as the director and gave the actors assignments, while talking about making theater, acting, and watching. This was the last show in the Blind Date series, where experimental Dutch theater is given a platform and where the shows enroll in a competition. The audience grades each show; at the end of the series the winner receives €45,000. This show in my opinion stands a good chance of winning, although there were a few other really good shows too. And of course, some of them were terrible 
.
A more serious thought about this season is that it may be one of the last for the LAK. Leiden University will halt financing the theater in September 2010 as part of their budget cuts. Since January, the theater is desperately looking for new ways to finance itself. Without structural financial aid, this wonderful theater will have to close after the ‘09/’10 season.
It’d be a costly loss for Leiden. The LAK is a lot of things that many other theaters are not: cheap, easily accessible, and with a qualitative program that knocks your socks off. It has a prominent place in the cultural community in Leiden. The dance shows are phenomenal (and usually sold out!), and there is just no place in Leiden that could fill the gap LAK would leave. For more information, please visit the website www.hetlaktheatermoetblijven.nl.
My name is Marco Hokke. My blog is about the things that interest me and things I might forget if I would not blog them.
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