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An actor’s dream!

Going Solo, India's only international solo theatre festival, returns with its third edition this year

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Nuala McKeever
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In the world of theatricality, solo acts are deemed prestigious for their ability to astound and captivate the audience single-handedly, which is no mean feat. To celebrate the unique style of solo acts in theatre, Teamwork Arts, known for producing one of the world’s largest free literary gatherings, the annual ZEE Jaipur Literature Festival, brings the third edition of Going Solo, India's only international solo theatre festival.
Going Solo pays homage to the one-man act, bringing together award-winning solo acts performed by talented artists from across the world. Many of the productions under Going Solo have been staged at the acclaimed Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which is a noted gathering of the world’s best theatre productions.  

This year’s acts
This year, the spotlight will be on two gifted artists—Nuala McKeever and Valentijn Dhaenens, who will be performing In The Window and Bigmouth respectively. Speaking about her act, McKeever says, “In The Window is a one-woman show about Margaret, a lonely woman who is planning to end her own life with a bottle of fizz and some pink pills, when a young man comes in the kitchen window. The play has four characters, all played by me.” On the other hand, Valentijn Dhaenens pays tribute to 2,500 years of oration. Ingeniously weaving together seminal speeches from the Grand Inquisitor and Socrates to Mohammed Ali and Osama Bin Laden, Bigmouth reveals that the tricks of rhetoric have hardly changed.

A touch of humour
While the subject of suicide may inject a tone of gravity, McKeever quips, “The subjects of suicide and loneliness and the desire to belong are all serious. But they are dealt with in a compassionate and human way.” Known as ‘Belfast’s Queen of Comedy’, a performance by McKeever is incomplete without humour. “Life is rather absurd but when we view it with gentle humour, we realise how similar we all really are,” she says.
McKeever will be performing in front of an Indian audience for the first time, but she’s excited. “I hope people enjoy the characters and the story. I will adapt my Irish accent a little to make it more understandable, as I did when I performed in Scotland and in the United States,” she says.
“I’ve always been fascinated by the power of words and the idea that the course of world history can be changed simply by opening one's mouth and produce sound." Dhaenens admires Socrates for his massive influence on modern speechwriting. Speaking about today's orators, Dhaenens says, "I can watch Louis Farrakhan for an hour on YouTube. His oratory skills show a beautiful balance between aggression, musical dynamics, build-up and climax.”

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