The train from Gothenburg runs through the Swedish wilderness. I get an insight into how central farming and rural life is to Sweden. The landscape's flat and icy, with tall elegant woodland. I'm excited to see a deer, grazing calmly, and also a bushy-tailed fox, sneakily stealing up to a farm.
I meet Gustav Tegby, from Riksteatern, my host in Stockholm, at a branch of 'Wayne's Coffee'. This is a successful Swedish Starbucks-style chain, and the main reason why the U.S giant has failed to gain a foothold here - hurrah!
We rush off to catch a play in the nearby town of Uppsala. Along with Lund, this is the other key university town of Sweden - comparable to Oxford or Cambridge. 'Knutby' is about an infamous recent case in Sweden where the priest of a 'free church' (a term coined from when certain churches received taxes from the state, and other 'free' ones didn't) brainwashed his mistress into believing she was receiving texts from God, ordering her to murder his wife. The mistress eventually shot his wife dead.
It's a massive production, with a full choir and a cast of ten. A big attention-grabbing opening mixes video footage of the crime scene with a full gospel rendition of Jesus Washed my Sins Away. The first half is an extensive introduction to the world of the church and its personalities, leading to the priest entering before the intermission (perhaps a little too late, considering the play is supposed to reveal the background behind the murder).
The second half combines video footage, monologues, and scenes showing the shifting power relations between the priest, his mistress, and his wife. I feel that this power relationship wasn't explored as deeply as I'd like, and ask Gustav whether I'm missing the complexity, as a non-Swedish speaker? He doesn't seem to think so.
Back to my apartment to rest up for a big day of meetings and theatre tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment