An enemy of the people

The International Ibsen Festival in Oslo is the original and has inspired Ibsen Festivals around the world from Tokyo to Dehli to Minnesota.

This year's festival hosts the world’s biggest theatre award and stages a very different version of An Enemy of the People.

An Enemy of the People could not be more relevant. A play about an individual who stands against his own people, Rimini Protokoll turns it into a study of the city today asking: Do you agree that in matters of right and wrong the individual should take precedence over the multitude? Is “the strongest man in the world (…) the man who stands most alone?”

The Ibsen Festival has become an influential voice in world theatre and is not scared of controversy. Ibsen was a controversial playwright who changed theatre in Europe dramatically. The festival reflects this by showcasing truly original versions of Ibsen’s own plays and performances by influential international playwrights and directors.

The International Ibsen Award is the world’s biggest theatre award. This year, the award goes to German composer and director Heiner Goebbels. Two guest performances by Goebbels, Eraritjaritjaka and Stifters Dinge are included in the festival programme and the award ceremony and reception take place Saturday 8th September.

It is extraordinary that a little country in the far north has produced such world class playwrights; Ibsen is one of the wold’s most famous playwrights, contemporary Jon Fosse is being performed all over the world and now Arne Lygre is set to follow in Fosse’s footsteps. Arne Lygre’s I disappear will be performed during the festival.

The International Ibsen Festival is hosted by the National Theatre in Oslo 23rd August-9th September 2012.

Festival press passes and invites to the award ceremony for the International Ibsen Award are available. For more information, please visit nationaltheatret.no and www.internationalibsenaward.com or contact publicity manager Stine Strachan on stine.strachan@nationaltheatret.no.

Notes to editors:
· Ibsen was born in Norway in 1828
· Some of his most famous plays are A Doll’s House, Ghosts, Peer Gynt and Hedda Gabler
· Ibsen has been translated to 78 languages and performed in countries all over the world for over 100 years
· Ibsen influenced European writers such as George Bernhard Shaw, Oscar Wilde and James Joyce
· Many consider Ibsen the greatest playwright since Shakespeare
· Ibsen spent much of his life in Germany and Italy

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