By Laura Laabs (Text) and Leo Solter (Music)
Europe: one continent, one idea, one center of power. From fortress to free-trade zone to a spark of joy—and back again. Is this a utopia, or can we just throw it away? Is there anything left to salvage from the idea of its peacefully united peoples, bound together in freedom?
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LAST EXIT EUROPA
Europe: a kidnapped princess. What has become of her, after more than two thousand years held hostage by various ideologies, dictators, and bearers of hope? How is she doing? And where is she, anyway?
Hello, Europe, can you hear the signals? There, at a remote truck stop, somewhere on the edge of the Freedom Highway, right by the closed barrier, the slot machine still flickers dimly, the old continent’s last jukebox drones on, Brecht’s penny falls in vain into the stuffed animal claw machine. Here, at the go-go pole, a weary dancer spins night after night; the polish isn’t just chipped from her nails. Yet she wears her heart on her sleeve and sings her songs to the sleepless, the scattered, the remnants of the West—of subjugation and empowerment, of swords and sheaths, of prostitution and revolution.
When the spotlight comes on, you can see it: she wears a blue robe and a gleaming crown of golden stars. The dancer hasn’t needed that stupid bull for a long time now. It is her voice that gives her wings and lets her soar beyond all boundaries.
WITH Cora Frost and Die Schlangenknaben
DIRECTOR Laura Laabs MUSICAL DIRECTOR Leo Solter DRAMATURGY Dennis Depta SET DESIGN Dominik Kremerskothen COSTUMES Sophie Peters ASSISTANT DIRECTOR / PRODUCTION MANAGER Cara Freitag, Oskar Winiarski
IN GERMAN
