Project Archive
by Manfred Karge
Performed by Taru Sinclair
Directed by Bob Lockwood
About the Play
An old man retells his life: from carefree girl to crane operator, from young bride to soldier, from femme fatale to farm lad; Man to Man is an epic story of identity-switching in the fight for survival. Inanimate objects from the sparse set take on purpose as chairs become buildings and hiding places and lamps transform into other characters. This one-woman show is an adventure in the power of story and personal transformation.
Review from this summer in Portland:
"Sinclair is simply magnetic as she paces the stage, raging and mourning...The makeshift quality of the staging adds to the impression of seeing something intimate and rare."
Portland Mercury
Responses from UK audiences:
"Gripped me from beginning to end...fast-paced with surprising twists".
"A wonderful piece. Witty and moving."
Written in 1982 by German playwright, Manfred Karge, this witty and demotically poetic monologue , Spanning 50 years of history, with a cast of at least twenty, aged 8 to 80 and of both sexes, Man to Man is one-woman show of limitless possibility. The role, famously taken on by Tilda Swinton in the 1992 film version, is a demanding feat of chameleon-like metamorphosis, requiring dozens of characters to be played by the one performer.
"...Man to Man is a pungent, distrubing, electrifying solo show about an ordinary working class woman, who survives the Germany of the Weimar Republic and of Hitler..."(Joyce McMillan, The Guardian)
