U

U tells the epic journey of a very peculiar Ulysses, not the superhuman hero of Homer’s Odyssey but a huge polar bear. Taking as her starting-point Maria Alberta Menéres’ Ulisses, a children’s version of the Odyssey, stage director Joana Magalhães drew inspiration from that book’s opening line: “Who tells a tale, adds a detail.” Thus, going against the univocal slant of the tale, which glorifies the hero and his deeds, she decided to make it dialogue with a short story she had written, The Education of a Dictator. U is kidnapped by the inhabitants of a certain domestic-animal-ruled country, and educated in the principles of democracy to become a dictator. Made a leader against his will, U escapes and sets off on a journey back to Ithaca, the land of savages, in search of his lost identity, but on arriving there he finds himself once again welcomed as a messiah. U uses the wanderings of its main character through a black-and-white world to question the concept of the hero and our lazy attachment to the notion of a saviour who can forgive us and save us from disaster. In fact, a very real catastrophe, Penelope’s catastrophe, the planet Earth, continues to unfold, while we wait for a saviour. U’s basic intention is to set us thinking about democracy, as a collective, inclusive project.