Director Ivo van Hoof is making a theatrical adaptation of Marek Lucas Reinfeldt’s second novel. my dear favorite The Amsterdam premiere of the 22/23 season should take place at the International Theater Amsterdam (ITA). The company announced this.

Van Hoof read Renfeld’s novel on the day it was published. “I’m a fan,” he says over the phone. All from the previous book: Evening is discomfort. I read it greedily. I was captured by the first sentences. She’s one of those writers who knows how to make personal matters accessible to everyone.”

Obsession

my dear favorite It is the story of a 49-year-old vet and vet ‘The Chosen One’, the 14-year-old daughter of a farmer. During the hot summer they get close and develop an obsessive fascination with each other. Van Hove calls himself a country kid and feels familiar with the farming communities, where the Rijneveld books are located.

“That fourteen-year-old, who oscillates between a boy and a girl, she says, wants to leave, but is also having a hard time saying goodbye. This topic is close to my heart.”

Love between an older man and an underage girl is a difficult subject. Van Hoof: “It is wonderful that someone in the Netherlands could dare to write about such a forbidden relationship in an incredibly subtle way. The morbid character of that relationship was also incorporated into the meandering currents of feelings and thoughts. This is what distinguishes a great writer.”

Van Hove wants to turn the man’s monologue into dialogue and introduce several characters. “But I want to keep these zigzag sentences.”

Van Hoof says the idea of ​​turning this book into a stage was right there. “Already on the first page I took a pencil and started taking notes. I had that too when I was upstream The.”

The cow can’t be in the spotlight too much

Marek Lucas Reinfeldt Writer

Riegenfeld is delighted and says he is quite confident that “Grandmaster Ivo” would make a “cool adaptation” of her novel. She saw him for the first time summer guestsTwo years ago, she was emailing her.

“I was immediately impressed by his way of looking, how he told, his enthusiasm for his work and his love of literature. He is very passionate and passionate about his work, and I think we share it too: a love of imagination and language and a fascination to understand something.”

No requirements

Rijneveld makes no claims about the adaptation, but after a conversation with Van Hove, she believes they are on the same page in terms of story and language. “in a my dear favorite Language is very important, it is also a kind of celebration of the word, and this can also be done on stage. It is also considered a “forbidden affair” in good hands. The story is about forbidden love, about two people who perform a shocking dance with each other. If that changes, the story disappears. The theme of love – in all its aspects – is also what fascinates Evo. That changes. It’s true that it would be difficult for Evo to break into the story – I left no room for that, the language is very muddled.”

It also feels a connection. “Evo knows the smell of cow dung, the smell of silage, and he knows what life is like there. That makes it better for him to deal with translating my book on stage and understand the characters’ movements, dreams and desires.”

in his direction Greed among the elms (1992) Van Hoof made eight real cows. Do they come again? Van Hoof laughs. “I have already put many animals on stage. But I am not finished yet.” Rijneveld: „I would like that. The cow can’t be in the spotlight too much.”