As part of the European project for minority languages Phōnē Romke Gabe Draaijer creates for Tryater this modern day performance, together with people who speak (one of) the variations of the Frisian language. In ten rehearsals the group worked towards a humoristic enactment with a filosofical twist. In It lêste wurd (The last word) we experience the last goodbye to the Frisian language, where the dialects en small languages of the province bury their second national language.
We enter the hall, the chairs orderly placed next to each other. We had coffee and cake. Speakers clear their throats. In the coffin lies the language. The dialects and Frisian language variations say their farewells to the Frisian language today.
The performance is created with input from experts of Frisian linguistics and with the creative effort of the amateurs who take part. An extraordinary experiment, performed with the love for the language.
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Phōnē is an international project of seven theatre companies which are being subsidised by the European Union’s Creative Europe Fund, for which Tryater is the coordinator. All the theatre companies, for example alongside Tryater organisations from Breton, Galician and Sorbian are involved, create in their area a modern day, professional theatre production about their own minority language. The performances come together in july in a grand meeting in Tirol, with a delegation of all performers.
