Orlando – um prólogo

Year: 2018
Length: 45 minutes
Type of work: Solo Show
Photos by Luiza Palhares

The solo “Orlando- A prologue” dives into the novel “Orlando: a biography” (1928), written by Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), an influent British writer who lived in the 20 th century and widely contributed for the western feminist movement.

The solo dramaturgy and staging explore the so-called “consciousness flow” (or stream of consciousness), a narrative technique which used to be used by Virginia Woolf and that presents the ideal way of the character’s consciousness, with no interference from the author or narrator. This stream of consciousness used in the literature is experimented as metalanguage in the actress’ scenical writing, which takes turns through several narrative voices. At a moment, it comes out through the voice of the author and biographer Virginia Woolf. At another moment, through the character’s voice, Orlando, and finally, through the actress’ voice which is presented as a kind of crisis of scenic speech.

Ideas which echo on stage through a direct game with the audience- so-called a lecture- play- in which themes such as violence, gender issues, freedom, loneliness, love and death are brought to a major reflection and discussion.

So as to emphasize the concept of present impermanence in the literary work, the art direction calls attention to the biggest wave worldwide as an interminable projection to the play, which is slowly revealed to the audience until it becomes a poetic landscape that invades the scene.

Artistic and Technical Information
Solo by Ludmilla Ramalho
Inspired in the work “Orlando: A Biography” by Virginia Woolf
Direction and Dramaturgy: Diego Bagagal
Assistant directors: Gui Augusto and Ludmilla Ramalho
Actress’ coach and tester: Gui Augusto
Texts: Virginia Woolf, Ludmilla Ramalho and Diego Bagagal
Costume design: Sônia Pinto
Lightning and technical coordination: Leonardo Pavanello
Production coordination: Ludmilla Ramalho