52 Hertz

Original title Najusamljeniji kit na svetu
Première 6. april 2022, SNG Nova Gorica

The first Slovenian performance
Running time 3 hours 15 minutes. One intermission. 

Director Mojca Madon
Translator Dijana Matković
Text adaptation and dramaturg Jaka Smerkolj Simoneti
Language consultant Anja Pišot
Set designer Urša Vidic
Costume designer Andrej Vrhovnik
Skladatelj Composer Luka Ipavec
Lighting designer Andrej Hajdinjak
Clown scene designers Ravil Sultanov, Natalia Sultanova
Sound designer Stojan Nemec

Cast
Girl Ivana Percan Kodarin as guest
Boy Žiga Udir
Mom Marjuta Slamič
Dad Peter Harl
Clown Matija Rupel
52 Hertz Ana Facchini

Somewhere underneath, in the vast depths of the Pacific Ocean, a whale calls every year. A whale nobody has ever seen but whom we have listened to since 1989. A whale who sings at a frequency incomprehensible to other whales. Somewhere above us, in the blackness of the universe pierced by starlight, the astronauts who have been stopping at the International Space Station since 2000 watch over us and see the Earth in all its smallness. Somewhere among us lives a happy family. Mum. Dad. A little boy who likes looking at the sky and wants to be an astronaut when he grows up. A girl who loves the sea and will … A family, so many of us know. And in the moment of the greatest loneliness, the greatest sadness, every one of them – and every one of us – faces the image that flushes all the sadness from our lives – a clown. A clown who is at the same time somewhere below and somewhere above. A clown that might be able to brighten up our lives with a trick or two. The young Serbian playwright Tijana Grumić intertwines three narratives in her poetic family drama. Using documentary materials as a starting point, she selects motifs that help her dissect the question of hope in a world filled with loneliness. It takes us on a journey through the life of a family, stretched between the sea and the universe, between the loneliest whale and the equally lonely astronaut, while a clown walks the Earth searching for meaning so that he can put on his red nose once again.

Director

Mojca Madon (1994) attended the Nova Gorica Grammar School where she was enrolled in the theatre programme. She studied theatre directing at the Academy of Theatre, Film, Radio and Television (UL) in the class of Jernej Lorenci. She graduated in 2018. 
One of her most successful academy productions was The Bald Soprano (2015), which was performed extensively in Slovenia and abroad. While still a student, Madon was a part of the SNT Drama Ljubljana youth lab; she wrote and directed The Uncanniest Guest (2016). 
She directed The Tip of the Iceberg (2017) and Hours, days, time (2019) on the Small Stage of the Ljubljana City Theatre and The Hoes (2021) at the Celje City Theatre. In the season 2019/20 she was the mentor to the Amateur Youth theatre AMO at the SNG Nova Gorica.

Producer