TRUTH TO POWER CAFE Comes to Theatre Works

 The Melbourne premiere of Jeremy Goldstein’s Truth to Power Café will be presented on the 5th and 6th of February 2025 as part of Midsumma Festival at Theatre Works. Melbourne participants of all ages, experiences and backgrounds will speak their truth to power in a unique theatrical celebration of time, place and community.

Truth to Power Café - a live and digital theatre event, is a profound theatrical reflection on loss, hope and resistance. This internationally acclaimed performance event has already been performed sixty times in eight countries, with eight hundred participants, many of whom have never been on a stage before.

Truth to Power Café is told through memoir, poetry, image, music, film and compassionate truth-telling from local people in each city in response to the question at the heart of the project "Who has power over you and what do you want to say to them?". Personal, professional, political, the answer to this question could be to parents, a sibling, politician, lover, landlord, neighbour, religious leader, boss, banker or simply a Best Friend. The Truth To Power Cafe calls on those who want to tell their truth before it's too late.

Speaking truth to power is a non-violent means of conflict resolution, the origins of which lie in the anti-war movement. In our era of post-truth and fake news, speaking truth to power is widely accepted to mean saying something to those in a position of trust or authority who don’t want to hear it.

Finding voice is of real importance to Truth To Power Café creator Jeremy Goldstein, whose personal memoir of truth and reconciliation frames the participant's monologues, and is performed by Jeremy at each performance. Goldstein’s struggle to overcome the power of his father, HIV and drug use is his own answer, told through monologue, poetry, image and music to tell the story of his complicated past and his resolve in the years following his father’s death. Jeremy’s passion in the belief that people need a space to speak their own truths to those who have power over them inspired him to create Truth To Power Café but as a whole new genre of theatre.  

“The show is inspired by the political and philosophical beliefs of Nobel Prize-winning playwright Harold Pinter and his inner circle The Hackney Gang. The Gang included my late father Mick Goldstein and Henry Woolf with whom I co-created the show directed by Liverpool UK director Jen Heyes." Said Jeremy Goldstein, Creator. "For sixty years the Gang held firm in their belief of an independent media and in speaking their truth to power. They remained firmly on the side of the occupied, and the disempowered, and their allies, and it is these people we invite to appear in the show, and respond to the question - who has power over you and what do you want to say to them? Ultimately, the show is a love letter to humanity and to the memory of my father Mick and his friends of sixty years, Henry Woolf and Harold Pinter."

Since 2018, Truth To Power Café has travelled the world, playing leading theatres and festivals in England, Scotland, The Netherlands, Croatia and Australia before live and online audiences of over half a million people. In the last twelve months the show had its US premiere at Lincoln Center New York where it was described as “a stunning work of theatrical activism” (The Queer Review), and this year won an Adelaide Fringe Award for Best Theatre for the performance in Kimba, a remote rural farming community in the Eyre Peninsula. In November 2024, the show had its Canadian premiere as part of the world-famous Chutzpah! Festival: The Lisa Nemetz Festival of International Jewish Performing Arts in Vancouver.

Truth To Power Cafe is now seeking people of all ages, experiences and backgrounds for the Midsumma Festival performances. To sign up an expression of interest is required in the form of 100 words responding to the question "Who has power over you and what do you want to say to them?". Submissions are open until Friday 17th January 2025 and can be submitted via truthtopower.co.uk/signupnow. Participants are remunerated and terms and conditions apply.

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