L'Addition
Tim Etchells / Bert & Nasi
Information
Times: 2pm, 7pm, 7:30pm
Tickets: Pay What You Can (Recommended Price £14)*
*all orders will be subject to a transaction fee of £2
Running Time: 70 mins (no interval)
Age Recommendation: 14+
This event takes place in person in our Council Chamber
A Tim Etchells and Bert and Nasi production
Produced by Forced Entertainment
Two performers armed with (or trapped in) a single scene – a customer orders a drink from a waiter. And then things go awry.
Directed by Forced Entertainment artistic director Tim Etchells, and created with the brilliant performance duo Bert and Nasi, L’Addition orchestrates a complex hilarious and explosive performance from simple materials.
Together, the three of them play with the mechanisms of theatre as much as with power relationships — but in the end, someone has to pay the bill.
‘Very weird and extremely funny’ The New York Times
★★★★ ‘Superbly absurd comedy’ The Guardian
★★★★ ‘L’Addition is as inventive and funny as it is challenging’ The Arts Desk
★★★★ ‘You never resent being stuck in this loop’ The Stage
★★★★★ ‘This extraordinary production will live long in the memory.’ Broadway Baby
Reviews from Edinburgh Fringe Festival, August 2024
Credits
A Tim Etchells and Bert and Nasi production.
Produced by Forced Entertainment.
Director Tim Etchells
Text by Tim Etchells with Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutsas
Devised and performed by Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutsas
Lighting Design Alex Fernandes
Composer & Sound Design Graeme Miller
Production Management Forced Entertainment
This production is an English language version of the original French production by Festival d’Avignon in 2023.
Co-production original version GRRRANIT Scène nationale de Belfort, Centre culturel André Malraux Scène nationale de Vandoeuvre-lès-Nancy, Théâtre de la Manufacture CDN Nancy Lorraine, CCAS les activités sociales de l’énergie, le Théâtre Silvia Monfort (Paris), La Vignette Scène conventionnée Université Paul-Valéry (Montpellier), Théâtre du Bois de l’Aune (Aix-en-Provence), Théâtre de Choisy-le-Roi Scène conventionnée d’intérêt national art et création pour la diversité linguistique, Théâtre Alibi (Bastia), The Coronet Theatre (London).
Biographies
Tim Etchells
Tim Etchells is an artist and a writer based in the UK whose work shifts between performance, visual art and fiction. Etchells has worked in a wide variety of contexts, notably as the leader of the world-renowned Sheffield-based performance group Forced Entertainment. Recent publications include Vacuum Days (Storythings, 2012) and While You Are With Us Here Tonight (LADA, 2013). Etchells’ work has been shown recently at Cubitt, Hayward Gallery and Bloomberg SPACE in London, at Turner Contemporary and Compton Verney in the UK, at Witte de With, Rotterdam, Netherlands Media Art Institute (Amsterdam) and MUHKA (Antwerp). Currently Professor of Performance & Writing at Lancaster University, he was a Tate / Live Art Development Agency ‘Legacy: Thinker In Residence’ Award winner in 2008, Artist of the City of Lisbon in 2014 and he received the prestigious Spalding Gray Award in February 2016.
Bert and Nasi
Bertrand Lesca and Nasi Voutas are a contemporary performance duo that met in 2015 and have since created an entire repertoire of shows in the midst of a period of national and international austerity. Their work, in turn, is stripped back and minimalist though it deals with complex ideas and emotions. Their shows lie somewhere between performance, dance and theatre but if you had to pin them down on it, they’d probably say it’s theatre. In each of their shows, they celebrate the encounter with the audience deconstructing the model of live performance. They always seek to create a sincere and intimate connection with the spectators. Their shows have a nostalgic feel of an old friendship that you didn’t know existed. Together they have performed their shows on the international stages of PuSh Festival (Canada), Festival de Otoño (Spain), Sarajevo Mess (Bosnia), Adelaide International Festival (Australia), InTeatro (Italy), Avignon Festival (France) as well as MiTsp (Brazil). In 2020, Bert and Nasi received the Forced Entertainment Award in memory of Huw Chadbourn, which celebrates the work of contemporary artists reinventing theatre and performance in new ways and for new audiences.
Forced Entertainment
Forced Entertainment is an ensemble of six artists founded in 1984 and based in Sheffield. Touring and presenting their ground-breaking provocative performances across the UK, mainland Europe, North America, Japan, Australia and further afield, the group have sustained a unique collaborative practise for almost forty years. Led by the artist and writer Tim Etchells, the Forced Entertainment company includes designer and performer Richard Lowdon alongside performers Robin Arthur, Claire Marshall, Cathy Naden and Terry O’Connor. The group are committed to collective practice, involving and inviting national and international artists to work with us to challenge, develop and reinvent the theatre we make Forced Entertainment’s work explores and often explodes the conventions of genre, narrative and theatre itself drawing influence not just from drama but from dance, performance art, music culture and popular forms such as cabaret and stand-up. The group operate at different scales, shifting from intimate two-performer works focused on text, to spectacular productions with large numbers of people onstage. Exciting, challenging, entertaining and questioning, Forced Entertainment has influenced the ecology and experience of theatre in the UK and beyond and been key players in of the development of a truly contemporary theatre language, inspiring generations of UK and international theatre makers.
International Ibsen Award Winners 2016
Access
PRE EVENT INFORMATION
This event takes place in person in our Council Chamber. This space is on the first floor, with step-free access via a lift.
If you have booked a ticket you will receive an email from us before your performance detailing important information about your visit.
PERSONAL ASSISTANT/COMPANION TICKETS
If you require the assistance of a friend or helper to attend, we can make a free ticket available for your companion. You can book access companion tickets online or contact the Box Office to book by emailing access@bac.org.uk.
To book a free access companion online:
- log in to your account here
- go to ‘Other preferences’ and tick ‘I require a personal assistant/companion’.
- Choose the performance, date and seats you would like and if you add at least 2 tickets to your basket, then one of these will automatically become free.
PERFORMANCE INFORMATION
BSL Intepreted Performance: Wednesday 13 November
All performances will be Relaxed. We invite you to make yourself comfortable and move around if you need to and if you need to leave the performance at any point you will be allowed to return to the space when you feel ready.
Gallery
We believe in making our shows accessible to as many people as possible.
We offer tickets on a Pay What You Can basis for the majority of performances throughout the year. Tickets usually start at £8, and we have recommended pricing to help you to choose a price that works for you.
We know that ticket price is a huge barrier for some, and the Pay What You Can model offers people who can afford to pay the recommended price or more the chance to support others who can’t.
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