My kingdom for a joke

What we would not give for a good joke! We would lose our shirt, our dignity, the last scraps of support grants, our kingdom! My Kingdom for a Joke gets to the bottom of humour and entertainment, bringing the necessary earnestness – and using the means of contemporary performance. While the world’s tragedies exponentiate into infinity, while irony, cynicism, and resignation appear to be the sole opposites, Riel Efraim Ashbel and friends search for a true moment of cheerfulness, for humour as a way to cope with reality, as a practice creating community, as a bridge between the individual and the world.

Using resources such as stand up, improvisation, clownesque play and sketch comedy, those tried-and true wellsprings of fun Thelma Buabeng, Jessica Gadani, Colin Hacklander and Tatiana Saphir, with their very own contradictions and vulnerabilities, approach the audience again and again. They risk everything for a laugh. The possibility of failure only enhances the joy: When carefully constructed illusions and characters fall apart, a common reality seems ripe for the taking, and the impossible appears a little bit more possible.