Galway International Arts Festival opens Box Office in The Cornstore, Middle Street
20 June 2019
The Kneehigh team gives us five reasons why ★★★★★ Dead Dog in a Suitcase (and other love songs) is a must-see.
Following their triumphant GIAF debut in 2017 with Tristan & Yseult, Kneehigh are back with their theatrical tour-de-force Dead Dog in a Suitcase (and other love songs) based on John Gay’s The Beggar's Opera.
See it 16-20 July at the Bailey Allen Hall.
1. The company
Kneehigh is a Cornwall-based theatre company who tour nationally and internationally. For over 35 years it has created vigorous, popular and challenging theatre from its cliff-top base and always performs with joyful anarchy. Kneehigh is undoubtedly one of the UK's most exciting touring theatre companies, specialising in visually stunning, adventurous theatre, ensemble playing and beautiful live music. Its contribution to the UK theatre landscape is such that it is now studied as part of the drama curriculum.
2. Political relevance – what's the world coming to?
The world feels very strange right now. Very cruel, confusing and absurd. This anarchic and apocalyptic musical deals with political corruption and widespread injustice against a backdrop of cracked morality and the fevered need to survive. These themes haven't gone away.
3. A new version of a well-loved and enduring story
Gay's The Beggar's Opera hit an unsuspecting London like a thunderbolt in 1728. Here was an opera about low-born, mucky people doing low-born, mucky things to each other. Brecht adapted the story for The Threepenny Opera in the early twentieth century. Kneehigh's latest version of Gay's classic is anarchic and radical. It will move you, shock you, and make you laugh.
4. The team
It's directed by Kneehigh founder and artistic director Mike Shepherd and written by Carl Grose (recently appointed deputy artistic director), who has written some of Kneehigh's best-loved plays, including The Wild Bride, Tristan and Yseult and The Tin Drum, with music by Charles Hazlewood.
5. The music
Like Gay, celebrated composer and conductor Hazlewood has raided music from all genres to create a terrific score that is performed live by the company on stage. It straddles electro disco, new wave, grime, dubstep, noire, trip hop, punk, ska, as well as the great Purcell, so there really is something for everyone.
Dead Dog in a Suitcase (and other love songs)
Bailey Allen Hall, NUI Galway July 16 - 20.
16, 17 & 20 July, 7pm
18 & 19 July, 6pm
Matinees 17 & 20 July, 2pm
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