Theatre Lunatico Presents ATTEMPTS ON HER LIFE, October 21- November 13

The Theatre Lunatico ensemble returns to the stage in October to present Martin Crimp's seminal postmodern play, Attempts On Her Life.

A contemporary piece that offers insight, misdirection, contradictions, and commentary on the life of the protagonist - the unseen Anne - Attempts On Her Life opens on Friday, October 21 (press opening Saturday, October 22), and runs through Sunday, November 13 at La Val's Subterranean Theater in Berkeley.

Advance tickets (Pay What You Will) are available at https://attemptsonherlife.bpt.me/ or can be purchased at the door subject to availability. For more information on Theatre Lunatico, visit www.theatrelunatico.org.

Through an intentionally ambiguous gauntlet of 17 seemingly disparate scenes, playwright Martin Crimp attempts to define who Anne is (or was?) through hot button topics including pop-culture, political violence, and personal identity, among others. Theatre Lunatico's interpretation will be physical, intimate, and theatrical as the all-women ensemble grapples with the scenes in the script that so accurately reflect the chaos of the current day.

"The nature of truth today could not be more critical, or more difficult to define," notes director Michael Barr. "We constantly hear conflicting reports on what's happening, why it's happening, whether or not it's something to be concerned about - often coming from what used to be trusted sources, such as television news programs or supposed experts. How do we distinguish established facts from deliberate disinformation? Can we ever know the prejudices or ulterior motives of the person speaking?"

Since its premiere at London's Royal Court in 1997, Martin Crimp's Attempts On Her Life has been translated into more than 20 languages. Its 17 'scenarios for the theatre' creates a kind of post-modernist poem with no delineated characters (the script does not even provide names for the spoken lines, and the show can be performed with almost any number of people) and no traditional story line. Instead, the work becomes an intriguing puzzle about identity, truth, and what our society finds noteworthy. By turns distressing and hilarious, and always centered around the absent protagonist "Anne," Attempts On Her Life explores our modern obsessions with sex, pornography, violence, art, gossip, and more.

The all-female ensemble for Theatre Lunatico's Attempts On Her Life includes Devon DeGroot, Eileen Fisher, Jennifer Greene, Shawn Oda, Kateryna Ponomarenko, and Lauri Smith.

Theatre Lunatico is a Berkeley-based, ensemble physical theatre company devoted to narratives that place women center stage through the unique interpretive lens of their storytelling and commitment to gender parity casting. Past productions include Melancholy Play, Titus Andronicus, Convoy 31000, Dracula, and Kursk, among others. More information is available at www.TheatreLunatico.org.

Theatre Lunatico is a fully vaccinated and boosted company. All audience members are required to show proof of COVID vaccination and must remain masked while inside the theater. Performers will be unmasked during the performance.

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