I AM A Camera - a play from the book which gave us Cabaret

Picture this…

Place : Berlin 1930s,

Attitudes : decadence, excess, ambition.

Political landscape : Hitler is rising to power.

Location : A bed-sit in Fraulein Schneider’s lodging house.

Enter Sally Bowles: young, outrageous, outspoken - yet vulnerable.

“ I Am a Camera” is based on Christopher Isherwood’s novel ‘Goodbye to Berlin’ . It explores the plight of German Jews and romance in the face of antisemitism and racism. (The musical ‘Cabaret’ was based on the same book.)

Ann Stutz, director, is delighted with her cast and crew and looking forward to presenting this remarkable play.

She says: “Why not look through the lens to explore how Sally, a cabaret artist, navigates these times even if she has to sleep her way to the top.”

The play confronts subjects such as unwanted pregnancy and racism and is a telling reflection of history and life between the wars in Berlin.

The title is a quotation taken from the novel’s first page: “I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking.”

Christopher Isherwood is the ‘camera’ of the title.

Sally is mercurial - a creature of extravagant attitudes, given to parading her vices, enormously confident that she is going to take life in her stride. She is fond of describing herself as an “extraordinary interesting person” and she is vaguely disturbing. As the play progresses the audience becomes entangled in the almost unbearable reality of this girl.”

Tickets from 01780 763203.