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The Falsettos

Stacy Makishi

Stacy Makishi in The Falsettos, photo by Nikki Tomlinson
2013 – 2014

Performance GOLD”
– Dominic Johnson on The Falsettos at Toynbee Studios, Feb 2014

Stacy Makishi’s solo The Falsettos premiered to great acclaim at Chelsea Theatre in 2013 and has since toured to The Basement (Brighton), Arnolfini (Bristol), Colchester Arts Centre, Z Arts Word of Warning (Manchester), Live at LICA (Lancaster), Toynbee Studios (London), BRUT (Vienna), Norwich Arts Centre and Warwick Arts Centre. It is now a firm part of Stacy Makishi’s repertoire and available in 2014/15. It can now be accompanied by an award-winning documentary film by Claire Nolan, The Making of The Falsettos, featuring Stacy and key collaborators Joshua Sofaer, Lois Weaver, Vick Ryder and Peggy Shaw.

The Falsettos is classic Makishi in that it brings seemingly disparate ideas together in a poetic and disarmingly funny way. The Falsettos splices together influences from The Sopranos, E.T. And Barbra Streisand. Mobs, midlife, lowlife and taboo get the Makishi treatment – uncompromising, compassionate and joyously absurd. Geographically distant from her beloved and increasingly ancient mum in Hawaii, Makishi speaks the unthinkable yet undeniable desire to spare her any further pain by killing her. Perhaps love and violence are not such strangers after all.

Whilst audiences need not be familiar with Stacy’s previous work to be moved by The Falsettos, it does form a loose sequel – or perhaps companion piece – to Stacy’s earlier work, The Making of Bull: The True Story, which has toured across the UK and to Amsterdam, New York, Turkey, Slovenia and Vienna. It interrogates the very idea of the sequel, asking how artists remain faithful to their personal style, sensibility and vision without resorting to formulas, gimmicks, and expectations created by past works. How do artists respond to the maxim, ‘Make it like the last one only make it better’.

“The Falsettos, which Stacy casts as the reluctant sequel to her previous work The Making of Bull, is the treasure box of Stacy’s own mind …an honest and consequently hilarious reflection on depression, murder, reason, her mother’s mortality and post-life crisis.”

Jenna Corker, Ireview Theatre

“Stacy is such an stunningly engaging performer you don’t immediately notice how elegant the whole thing is but I loved how slowly this delicate network of ideas seemed to collect in a single real/imaginary moment in an apartment in Hawaii.”

Andy Field, Forest Fringe

The Falsettos is commissioned by Chelsea Theatre, Colchester Arts Centre and The Basement supported by The Roddick Foundation. Supported using public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England.

Stacy Makishi is Associate Artist with Chelsea Theatre and New Unity. The Falsettos is produced by Artsadmin.

Date Title Venue City
30 July 2014 The Falsettos Warwick Arts Centre Coventry
16 May 2014 The Falsettos Norwich Arts Centre Norwich
27–28 February 2014 The Falsettos brut Vienna
6–7 February 2014 The Falsettos Toynbee Studios
30 January 2014 The Falsettos Live at LICA Lancaster
29 November 2013 The Falsettos Z Arts (Word of Warning) Manchester
13 November 2013 The Falsettos Colchester Arts Centre Colchester
19 October 2013 The Falsettos Arnolfini Bristol
18 October 2013 Killing Time Arnolfini Bristol
17 October 2013 The Falsettos The Basement Brighton
24–25 May 2013 The Falsettos Chelsea Theatre London
Stacy Makishi in The Falsettos, photo by Nikki Tomlinson
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