Autumn 2020:
I am pleased and proud to welcome you to my new site.
I am indebted to Marleen, Mylaine, Anneloes, Manon, and Gijs of The Dare Company for their creativity, thinking along, and flexibility. Also to Els van Riel, who made the portrait photos. And last but not least to my brother Stefan Dorren, who translated all texts into English, except for these two sentences. In all his modesty, he does not want to be mentioned on the credits page, but on this first news page he cannot avoid it.
This site is an elaborate visiting card and gives you some idea of my professional activities past and present. On this page, I will keep you informed about the latest developments.
I have been working as an actor for 44 years, the last 18 years of which also as a communication trainer and a coach. I am grateful for all the insights and experiences I have gained throughout those years. I feel the need to report on this journey on this new site, and particularly on the way I am currently going. As an actor I am exploring a new way, which I call non-intentional theatre. You can read about it in my blogs; photos, descriptions, and reviews are the witnesses. On this site, I invite the readers to participate in this exploration. These projects are never closed. If you should be interested in developing one of these performances further, please let me know. It would be my pleasure to do this together. Also if you have a proposal, I should like to hear from you.
In the past two years, I kept wondering where the common ground between my activities as a theatre-maker and those as a communication trainer/coach might be, where these make each other possible. While working on this site, I found the answer. The key words are journey, flexibility, amazement, curiosity, trust, inclusivity, daring to let go instead of controlling. These words regularly appear in the theatre blogs. A blog about training and development is in progress. Until several years ago, the emphasis in both areas was on the destination of the journey, but now the object has shifted to the journey itself.
I wish you pleasant reading and looking around. Let me know if you have any questions, feedback, or suggestions.
Just before the international lockdowns took effect and air traffic virtually came to a standstill, we could give a performance of Kitan at the Ekō-Haus in Düsseldorf and at the OPENING20 Festival in Trier in February 2020. This time, the cast consisted of Els van Riel (video/film), Antoine Beuger (composition, flute), Hitomi Nakamura (hichiriki), Mami Tsunoda (ryūteki), Kō Ishikawa (shō), Sanae Kagaya (Butō dance), and myself as an actor. This project, based on texts by Japanese poet Matsuo Bashō and Irish writer Samuel Beckett, had been performed previously in Tokyo and Düsseldorf. The performances in February were highly successful. Els is currently making a teaser on the basis of video and audio material to find new play locations.
Additionally, the three Japanese musicians – united in the Chitose Trio – performed traditional Japanese Gagaku music in Luxembourg. Hitomi, Mami and Kō are also members of the world-famous Gagaku orchestra Reigakusha from Tokyo. During this concert, there was a choreography by the Tomoe Shizune & Hakutobo Ensemble, created on a composition by Tomoe Shizune and danced by Sanae Kagaya, choreographer and dancer of the Butō ensemble. During the concert, I was the French-speaking ringmaster.
Again, performing Kitan was a most profound experience, and I sincerely hope we will find more opportunities to play Kitan.
Cascando is a fascinating text by Samuel Beckett from 1962. I used several parts of this radio play for Kitan. I put the COVID-19 lockdown to good use by learning the entire text and by living with it. So far, this has yielded a great many ideas. In October, I will start a first exploration together with composer and clarinettist Germaine Sijstermans. On the basis of the principles of non-intentional theatre (see blogs), additional performers will undoubtedly be involved in the future.
Intuitively, I associate this text with One Island, a poem by Robert Lax (2000). In the course of the rehearsals, it will become clear how to combine both texts.
On 16 March, the entire diary was emptied all of a sudden, due to the corona containment measures. It meant no income and eating into my reserves. The measures for the self-employed so generously promised by several ministers were of no use, because they were actually only intended for covering fixed operating expenses. I only have high operating expenses while travelling, but day-to-day living also costs money. Fortunately, the Professional Training for Lawyers, where I work as a communication trainer and mentor, has not been sitting around doing nothing and has converted the curriculum into virtual modules. Virtual education is far from ideal, and seriously lacks the dynamic of direct-contact education. Yet, the efforts of the Professional Training for Lawyers have prevented worse damage for May, June, and July. In late August and early September, I was allocated two groups in Cohort 14, which I will be monitoring for the next two and a half years as a trainer and mentor. Fortunately, the training modules will take place live, provided that there will be no second lockdown. Let’s keep our fingers crossed!
Training sessions have also been planned this autumn for an urban Safe Home organisation. As a trainer I will also give guidance to a safety conference at one of the Dutch Courts. For privacy reasons, the names of the organisations and institutions are not mentioned here. Sirius Training en Advies has commissioned me to give these training sessions.
Together with Mariëtte Ham I will fulfil the role of co-trainer to familiarise dentists and the employees of two dental practices with the DISC personality profiles. Knowledge of these profiles will provide more insight into the colleagues’ possible motives and is an invitation to curious exploration instead of a rejection forthwith.
As a training actor I will help the Professional Training for Lawyers several times with the practice explorations of lawyer trainees. I will support Laurent Chamuleau, trainer at Luniek, as an actor in training employees of a large hospital.
Henk Koop, of Koop & Co, has been active during the lockdown. I owe it to him that I could perform Paolo de Zebratemmer online a number of times for primary-school groups 1 and 2 in June and July. Of course, a streaming performance cannot beat a live performance, but still it was quite an experience, especially for the children who could finally watch a performance after having been at home for a long time.
In Ahoy, Rotterdam, I played the performance for six days at Jeugdvakantieland (Youth Holiday Land) in August, an event, especially for children whose parents cannot afford to go on holiday. With great pleasure I played 18 performances, and I enjoyed the interaction with the children and their parents.
Some 80 performances have been planned in the provinces of Groningen, Drenthe, and Limburg as well as in Rotterdam for this autumn. In the unhoped-for event that there will be a new lockdown, we can at least stream the performances.
Paolo de Zebratemmer in Ahoy, Rotterdam