‘One hour of hugging, one hour is enough for me, then I know how it feels.’
Judith Herzberg, The little mermaid
Judith Herzberg adapted Hans Christian Andersen's well-known fairy tale into a poetic libretto commissioned by the Dutch music theatre company Orkater. This Orkater production premiered at the Toneelschuur in Haarlem in January 1986.
In October 1999, the text was given a second life in a joint production by WALPURGIS, theatre company De Roovers and children's arts centre BRONKS. The performance played in a dream location: Les Bains, Forest's municipal swimming pool, which closed in the late 1980s. The empty pool was the bottom of the sea, the grand piano on the pool floor the palace where the mermaids grew up under the care of their grandmother. The gallery of dressing rooms above the pool was the perfect ship; even the railing over which the shipwrecked prince tumbles into the sea was not missing. The circulation space around the pool was the land, the people's living space.
The disadvantage of making the production in this exceptional location was that it was short-lived. The very enthusiastic audience response prompted the makers to turn it into an auditorium production in the 2000-2001 season. In January 2001, the reworked version premiered at deSingel in Antwerp. The touring version brought some changes: the grand piano was replaced by a concert harp, the playing space had to be used differently, but the performance retained its poetry and poignancy.
Apart from being a fairy tale about love The little mermaid for Charo Calvo, Stef Depover, Jan De Vree, Cécile Marichal and Judith Vindevogel of music theatre collective WALPURGIS and Sara De Bosschere and Luc Nuyens of the Roovers, a metaphor for their shared desire to unite the worlds of music and the spoken word.
Reviews
‘As the alter ego of little mermaid De Bosschere, Vindevogel sings, while De Bosschere focuses on the lyrics. A collaboration that becomes very beautiful when both voices overlap. With whispers, with shouts. Like the rolling of the bars on the sea. The little mermaid balances word and music in a pearl gleaming in its shell.’
Roel Verniers, De Standaard
‘Just as Judith Herzberg did earlier in her libretto, the makers retrace the fairy tale of The little mermaid to its essence: the desire to be included in the world of adults, the desire to love and be chosen by the beloved, the sacrifices you make to do so. The fairy tale was thus stripped of its drama (and also its moralising finger), but in exchange it gets a very intense poetry on all levels: text, music, sound, play, space, light. (...) From The little mermaid you can enjoy, enjoy, enjoy with all your senses for an hour...’
Marleen Baeten, Appelblad
