If John Buijsman were not John Buijsman, I bet he wanted to become John Buijsman. The striking actor and jazz prophet has temporarily dragged his entire John Buijsmanness along to an ice rink in Twente, forging a completely natural link between Enschede and Rotterdam. Because the archetypal Rotterdam man is also coming to a factory hall in the Maas city with this mega performance.
A modern Diogenes, in other words. Because his role resembles that of the washed-up philosopher who 25 centuries ago lived like a dog in an Athenian wine barrel, giving cynicism its name. That is what Buijsman plays in Tombola, a show about an old man who resists the new era, which comes to him in the form of demolition-new construction plans by an ambitious city council. He has lived in his little house all his life, and wants to keep it that way. So he must and will also die there. Along this modern reclusive amphora passes a procession of people who want to change his mind, while he maintains a fragile friendship with a junkie who wants to be a poet.
Extra Large
This story, which gradually loses its mundane logic, was written by Peer Wittenbols. Buijsman and and award-winning playwright Wittenbols already worked more often together, but mostly in small-scale outdoor screenings for summer festivals. Tombola is an XXL version of those small performances, and it ends up being quite surprising, not least because of the input of jazz great Keimpe de Jong, who wrote the soundtrack for choir and orchestra.
It contains a few poetic gems and dialogues with an absurd edge, which is a speciality of Wittenbols. Actress Juul Vrijdag, whom we see too little, but usually fortunately often in Wittenbols' work, plays the unexpected love interest for the stolid caveman. She can even sing a very nice Spanish song.
Miracle of engineering
Keimpe de Jong wrote a score which may sound a little abrasive to people expecting smooth musicall songs. That this music sounds so good, by the way, is quite a miracle of technical ingenuity. The Ice Hall in which Tombola plays is a challenge in terms of acoustics, to put it mildly. Hit a cymbal there once and it reverberates until the next Winter Olympics. Because you can't mute a drum kit, so they put it in a box.
The orchestra, with horns and an Arabian percussionist who can play softly, now plays with a drum computer and it sounds remarkably clear in that gigantic concrete hall. The choir, which would also be drowning in reverb in such a mega hall, also manages to sound quite intimate thanks to soft singing in contact microphones amplified over loudspeakers suspended just above the audience.
Typically Twents?
Theaterproducties Twente, under whose auspices Tombola was created, delivers something new with this production. Until now, the producer specialised in typically Twente stories, often in a historical setting and extremely accessible to local audiences who are not so often to be found in the plush of the theatre. With its metropolitan theme, this Tombola offers something new, which you would expect to find in Rotterdam rather than Enschede, until you realise that is possibly a rather suburban idea. As if Enschede does not also have to deal with old, staid residents in old working-class neighbourhoods and people who resist any kind of future.
It's a pity that a location could not be found in Enschede that even outside more resembles the world in which the play is set. Big industry has disappeared from Enschede's city centre some time back. The Twente ice rink is located along the cycle highway between Enschede and Hengelo at the end of a rather apocalyptic-looking ‘entertainment zone’, consisting mainly of car parks, all-you-can-eat restaurants, a mega cinema and an indoor kart track, next to FC Twente's huge stadium. More Blade Runner than All in the Family, shall we say. The fact that it is called ‘Kennispark’ owes it mainly to the campus of the University of Twente, on the other side of the railway.
Still, nice to get to know this side of ‘the region’ for a change. Then again.
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