Family

For Family, theatre producer Louis Janssens invited four actors from different generations to join him on stage. They tell stories, ask questions, and seek comfort, support, and recognition from each other. About how family ties connect us and – inescapably – determine our lives. About blood family and chosen family. About parents, children, growing up, and the fear of being left alone. The actors are on stage as themselves but also seem to become each other's family more and more throughout the performance. 

This creates a poetic text performance about the universal phenomenon of family. Starting from a queer perspective they tell a larger human story about having and searching for a family. Not everyone has children, but ultimately, we are all children.   

Louis Janssens created the performance Family together with an intergenerational queer cast consisting of Peter Seynaeve (NTGent, Het Zuidelijk Toneel), Maureen Teeuwen (Maatschappij Discordia, mugmetdegoudentand), Mourad Baaiz (Artemis/hetpaleis/Het Zuidelijk Toneel, Schauspielhaus Bochum), & Francis Geeraert (Compagnie Barbarie).

• Louis Janssens (b. 1995) graduated from the Drama program at KASK Ghent in 2018. From 2012 to 2022 he formed the two-headed collective Desnor with Ferre Marnef. They made several performances, including Ideale Plaats, #BOS, Galileo, and Toverberg. His solo performance Serenade premiered in 2021 and was selected as #nieuwjong at Het TheaterFestival 2021. In 2022 he created the performance Analoog with Willem de Wolf at De Hoe (selected at Het TheaterFestival & Nederlands Theater Festival 2023). The performance Desire premiered in August 2023 during Theaterfestival Boulevard and was selected for Het TheaterFestival 2024. He is associated with Monty as an artistic sounding board. As a teacher, he is involved in the Acting course at Antwerp Conservatory of Music.