The Falsettos

7.30pm. £12/£10

Stacy Makishi’s new show The Falsettos premieres at Chelsea Theatre as part of SACRED on 24 & 25 May.

The Falsettos splices together influences from The Sopranos, E.T. and On A Clear Day You Can See Tomorrow starring 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’.

Presented as part of SACRED at Chelsea Theatre, Stacy will also be performing The Making of Bull: The True Story on 20 May.

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, Artsadmin and New Unity.