Sloan Bradford, Isaac Bush and Anne Simon address the ABAL lunch Delano staff

Sloan Bradford, Isaac Bush and Anne Simon address the ABAL lunch Delano staff

Amcham Luxembourg, which organizes the monthly ABAL luncheons, had partnered with The Circle Theater Of New York and the Théâtre National du Luxembourg to showcase new play “Strangers”. The business organization promises this would be the first of several cultural and social events this year that diverges slightly from its usual programme.

“Strangers” is an original work conceived by Luxembourg director Anne Simon and colleagues from the New York company. It explores the themes of memory and mortality as they relate to modern threats of climate change, surveillance, the spread of disease and the fears of a rapidly shifting world.

Together with Circle Theater’s Sloan Bradford and Isaac Bush, who wrote the play, Simon gave a brief presentation of the process involved in developing the piece from the bare bones of an idea. Unlike previous collaboration “Hansel and Gretel-Trail of Crumbs”, the creators explained that this work was not wholly devised but was co-authored in advance by Bradford and Bush and has as its basis “The Invention of Morel” by Argentinian novelist and journalist Adolfo Bioy Casares, as well as ideas from the writings of Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus and Albert Einstein. “But there is still a lot of character development that happens during rehearsals on stage,” Simon explained.

Simon also gave the audience an insight into the funding model for small theatre productions, which she says is very different in the United States and Europe. Theatre cannot and should not rely solely on subsidies and public finances, but must seek new models. “We are reaching out to partners not directly involved in the arts to see where that collaboration can go,” she said.

Guests were then invited into the theatre space to watch the troupe in rehearsal as the ran through several key scenes from “Strangers”.

The world premiere of “Strangers” is on Saturday 27 January at the Théâtre National du Luxembourg, route de Longwy, Luxembourg-Merl. Further performances take place on 30 January and 1, 2 and 4 February. Tickets can be booked here.