Arts Centre Vooruit, Ghent, Belgium

“Move your little finger and/You can change the world/Why should you be blue/When you’ve your little finger?/Prove how just a little finger can /Change the world.”

Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States. He has already received more death threats than all the other Presidents put together. The topic of Assassins – based on a musical by Stephen Sondheim – couldn’t be more relevant: the characters have all murdered an American president. Freeman does, however, manage to inject some comedy in the subject.

Freeman shows the dark side of the American Dream in a twist on a typical American genre: the musical, a genre that is bursting with show, entertainment value and magnified emotions. “Assassins questions the American Dream and patriotism. It’s really a story about how far America can go before it destroys itself. You have to accept the American Dream. But what if that dream is assassinating the President? Do you have to accept that as well? Does this fall under the freedom of democracy too?” (Freeman in De Morgen, 18.09.08 – read more on www.vooruit.be). The characters in Assassins are individuals who want to make a difference. In their own way, they try to change the world with violent force. They are prepared to reach their goal by any means necessary. But have their actions really changed the face of the world?

Assassins seems to be set up as a press conference: all the actors are seated at a long table. Among these eight perpetrators sits a child: Freeman’s daughter. The musical’s cast does not consist of musical stars and opera singers, but of ordinary performers that just like to sing. On top of that, there is no real orchestra, only a live pianist who performs all the musical segments by himself. One of the actors who was unable to join the cast for this performance will be replaced by renowned Flemish actor Dirk Roofthooft.

American actor Davis Freeman has starred in American films and TV series and has worked on productions by Superamas, Damaged Goods, and Les Ballets C. de la B. Together with Portuguese choreographer Lilia Mestre, Freeman founded the Random Scream company, which will be a guest at Vooruit in March with the piece Saving Lies.

Stephen Sondheim, composer and writer nearing the blessed age of 80, is predominantly known for his hit musical West Side Story and Sweeney Todd, which was recently made into a film by Tim Burton. He has honoured with several accolades in his career: a Grammy, an Oscar for Best Original Song, the Pulitzer Prize, and several Tony’s, including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre. Assassins first came out in 1990, when US troops invaded Iraq during the first Gulf War. The musical was cancelled because of its supposed antipatriotic message. A planned resumption of the play in 2001 was cancelled after the 9/11 attacks. Assassins could finally be performed without any further controversy in 2004.