Plärren

Director: Yumin Ao

Playwright: Fabian Hartje

Cast: Johanna Schwung, Viktoria Labitzke

Time: July 6, 2021

Venue: Deutsches Theater in Göttingen

Plärren is a text without characters or dialogue, consisting only of streams of words, abundant onomatopoeia, fragmented sentences, and a note from the playwright about his inspiration for writing it: according to news reports, the world’s most stable permafrost in Siberia is thawing due to climate change, reviving 24,000-year-old bdelloid rotifers. The playwright mentioned that he would not participate in rehearsals but planned to attend the final performance. I was, of course, delighted by this level of trust, and even more excited when he gave me full freedom to modify the script as I saw fit.

For the stage adaptation, I introduced characters and a storyline to what was essentially a plotless, seemingly meaningless text. Through a second wave of creative development, it transformed into the story of a “mad” biologist in a laboratory. The production incorporated elements of Japanese avant-garde dance, Butoh, capturing the cries of life on the edge of death, the search for liberation of body and mind, and the subtle emergence of new organic forms at critical moments.

Interestingly, although rotifers reproduce asexually, they can acquire (or “steal”) new genetic material from other organisms, perhaps contributing to their remarkable resilience and ability to revive after millennia. This biological quirk became a central metaphor in the piece, raising questions about the continuity of human life along two parallel pathways: biological inheritance and cultural legacy. It reflects on the finite nature of our physical existence, the eternity of the afterlife, and the potential for spiritual reincarnation.

Plärren 是一个没有人物和台词的文本，只有连篇的词语、大量的拟声词、断裂的句子，和作者告诉我他写作这个剧本的灵感来源 —— 据新闻报道，在西伯利亚，全世界最稳定的冻土层，因为气候暖化，封冻了2.4万年的蛭形轮虫复苏了。剧作者表示，他不会参与排练，但要来看最后的演出。给到这番信任，我当然高兴。更让我兴奋的是，他允许我随意改动剧本。我为作品的舞台呈现重新设计了人物和情节，对这个基本无情节看似无意义的文本进行了较大改编。经过二度创作之后，它变成了一个发生在实验室里的关于一位“疯狂”的生物学家的故事。在编排上结合了日本现代舞蹈艺术——舞踏，表现生命在死亡的边缘呐喊，追求肉体与心灵的解脱，同时，新的有机体在微妙的时间点酝酿生长。有趣的是，轮虫虽然是一种属于无性繁殖的微生物，但它能从其他生物有机体获得（盗取）新的生长基因。这也许是它能够复苏的另一个重要原因？Plärren 这部作品想探讨的主题是，人类的生命会沿着生物遗传和文化遗传两条途径进行延续，此生有限，来世永恒，而精神上的轮回得以实现。

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