Following an award-winning run at the Bedford Fringe in 2019, writer/performer Ana Luiza Ulsig brings her tale of finding one’s own self, The Journey of a Warlike Mind, to the 2020 VAULT Festival next month. Time to book your tickets.
The thought provoking play about how family and social structures mold us into misshapen beings, and how trauma can become one’s own salvation runs as part of the festival on 1 and 2 February 2020.
Based on a true episode of a mental breakdown that occurred during the impeachment process of Brazil’s first female president, Dilma Rouseff, in 2016, and on stories of childhood, trauma, love and loss, The Journey of a Warlike Mind explores the inherent tension in the relationship between the many voices that inhabit our minds and establishes an up-to-date discussion on gender at a deep and intimate level.
Rose rises from the dead. She prepares for an imminent war, for the extreme necessity of transformation of a woman’s soul; a woman who has stopped feeling. She has the key to the mind of Eva, and takes the audience on a journey through imagination, memory and dreams on the hardest journey of all; from the mind to the bottom of the heart.
The tragicomic and bittersweet The Journey of a Warlike Mind follows a woman unafraid to laugh off her fortunes and misfortunes, express her child self with joy and dive headfirst into the jungle of the soul. It explores change, transformation and transcendental hope as it tells a story about rediscovering the roles we play in our own lives and breaking the patterns that have been rigidly built within us.
Watch The Journey of a Warlike Mind teaser trailer
When Uslig took staged the production in Bedford in 2019, it won the Spirit of the Bedford Festival Fringe Award.
Ulsig is a Brazilian-Danish actress and writer who has been living in London since 2017. The playwright and performer, who has an MA from Rose Bruford College has written and co-written eight plays and worked with major Brazilian theatre companies including Cia Ensaio Aberto, Ta na Rua and Cesgranrio Cultural. She is also the co-founder of Unchained Theatre Company, who staged Nine at the Drayton Arms in the summer of 2019. She also appeared in Liberty at the Deptford Heritage Festival in 2019, when Dress Circle Reviews described her as “a terrific character actor with perfect comic timing and a scene stealer throughout.”
Running from 28 January to 22 March 2020, VAULT Festival describes itself as “London’s biggest, boldest and wildest arts and entertainment festival”. Running across Waterloo, in 2019 it attracted more than 79,000 audience members to see 428 different shows staged by more than 2,000 artists.
It’s 2020 offering is just as eclectic, include productions such as Grid Theatre’s Kafka-inspired Camden Fringe hit Red Peter, odd couple comic drama Essence and immersive gaming experience Jekyll/Hyde.