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EARTH IN TRANCE
December 14 - 30 at La MaMa

"a daring innovator of form and content... highly personal and visually beautiful creations" -- The New York Times

"ingenious and daring... Thomas, together with Peter Sellars and Robert Wilson, makes up that trio of wild boys who have been shaking and moving European and American theatre for the last decade." -- The Independent

"He is a poet in the theater." -- Philip Glass

La MaMa E.T.C. presents the New York Premiere of Brazil’s Dry Opera Theater Company in EARTH IN TRANCE. This highly stylized comedy is written and directed by avant garde legend Gerald Thomas. The original Brazilian cast, which includes Fabiana Gugli and puppeteer Juliano Antunes, stars in Thomas’ new English language translation of the piece. Performances of this limited engagement run begin December 14th at La MaMa as part of its 45th Anniversary Season.

EARTH IN TRANCE orbits around a diva who is trapped in her dressing room. While she slowly goes mad, she tells her life story to a swan who lives back stage. Descending into madness, she never stops feeding the animal "for foie gras purposes."

Described by The New York Times as "the eternal enfant terrible of Brazilian theater" Gerald Thomas has established a reputation as a visionary director of the avant garde while working in collaboration with artists including Samuel Beckett, Heiner Muller and Philip Glass. From 1979 - 1984 he directed 98 plays by Beckett at La MaMa; included among these were All Strange Away and That Time starring Julian Beck in his only performances outside The Living Theater. In 1985, Thomas founded The Dry Opera Theater Company in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Here he has created nearly two dozen works including The Flash and Crash Days, The Kafka Trilogy, The Ventriloquist and Waiting for Beckett that have been seen in 15 countries with stops including Lincoln Center, Munich State Theater and Vienna's Wiener Festwochen. Thomas is the recipient of three Moliere Prizes and eighteen other awards. He has been the subject of television documentaries for the Germany’s NDR 3, Brazil’s TV Cultura, USA's PBS and Austria’s ORF. In 2003, he was indicted for public indecency in Brazil after mooning an audience who booed his radical reworking of Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, sparking debate and landing his derriere on newspaper covers internationally. He is currently working on his autobiography, Suicide Note.

EARTH IN TRANCE runs December 14 - 30, Thursday - Saturday at 8:00pm and Sunday at 2:30pm & 8:00pm. (Note: no performance on December 24.) La MaMa E.T.C. is located at 74 East 4th Street (between 2nd Avenue and Bowery -- accessible from the F/V train at 2nd Avenue or the 6 train at Astor Place). Tickets are $15. To purchase tickets call 212-475-7710 or visit lamama.org.