detheatermaker

I am Britney,
Britney Spears.
I am Britney Spears.
I mean:
I am Britney Spears.
I know…
I know what it’s like to be Britney because I am Britney.
Britney Spears!
Really.
Whatever.

Being Britney is a solo performance in which Colette Goossens plays a young woman who believes she is the pop icon Britney Spears. Britney experiences an acute psychosis. In an uncontrolled, associative, and wild way, she tries to resolve fundamental questions about her existence. She finds herself in her bathroom, an intimate space in which a world of hallucinations, delusions and extreme emotions unfolds.

Being Britney raises questions about psychosis and the care surrounding it. What is a psychosis really? Should we see psychosis as an endpoint? Or should we instead look at the rich thoughts and experiences hidden beneath it?

Through existing and newly written texts, acting, physicality, and rhythm, Colette explores how mental vulnerability can take on an open form on stage without being stigmatizing. Being Britney is a continuation of her artistic research, in which she makes the inner logic of mental disintegration tangible for an audience.

Photo: Yana Van Nuffel