“The Faggots and their Friends Between Revolutions” announced at Bregenz Festival
17 November 2022 - news
My next opera, The Faggots and their Friends Between Revolutions, has just been announced by Bregenz Festival in Austria, in July 2023. This will not be the world premiere (which is still to be announced), but will be the Austrian premiere.
After five years of planning, it is wonderful to finally announce my third music theatre piece, my second large-scale written with Ted Huffman, and our eighth collaboration. The show, which we are calling a ‘baroque fantasia’, is based on the 1977 cult book of the same name by Larry Mitchell (illustrations by Ned Asta). We have reworked Mitchell’s text into a kaleidoscopic, hyper-theatrical bedtime story, that re-imagines the history of the world in the fantasy city of Ramrod, where fables and myths become a celebration of sex, pleasure, and queer community: a manifesto for survival.
Fifteen performers will bring this piece to life on stage, including baroque and modern instruments, led by Music Director Yshani Perinpanayagam and directed by Ted Huffman. Our dramaturg is the the theatre-maker Scottee.
The work has been commissioned by Manchester International Festival, Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Bregenzer Festspiele and NYU Center in New York City. Other performances, including the world premiere, and the rest of the creative team and cast will be announced in due course.
Illustration © Bregenzer Festspiele. Title image by Ned Asta, from the cover of the book.