PING PONG

by Michael FRAYN Kellertheater Innsbruck 4 FEMALE ROLES also starring: Wolfgang HUNDEGGER, Anja PÖLZL, Walter WALTZ Assistant director: Judith KNOLL Set design: Bertrand MACKOWITZ Costumes: Sigrid WENTER Production technology: Max MÜHLBACHER Director: Evelyn FRÖHLICH

In this play Michael Frayn portrays today's world, in which modern technology was supposed to make life easier but only leads to new complications and annoyances:
Electrical appliances and their noises take on a life of their own, machines become lonely tyrants. Since the play's premiere in London in 1998, technology has developed at a tremendous pace. Even so, we still talk to answering machines, are irritated by electronic beeps and struggle with instruction manuals. Frayn takes aim at people and their social and technological dependencies.

PRESS

TIROLER TAGESZEITUNG (19 June 2008)

THE TYRANNY OF TECHNOLOGY
… On Bertrand KACKOVITZ's multifunctional set (costumes: Sigrid WENTER)
the acting quartet of Anja PÖLZL, Susanne SCHARTNER, Wolfgang HUNDEGGER and Walter WALTZ shows itself at its best. At times they get to be utterly chaotic hosts, at others stressed hotel guests, and at others „speechless“ employees at a company party. What unites all these characters is their trouble with smoke detectors, answering machines and ovens, with everything that pings and pongs and hums. Yet it is not only the tyranny of technology that drives people to the brink of a nervous breakdown; many a relationship is not as cosy as it ought to be…..