A shattering play about the fall of a family and the clash of cultures – yet with a dramaturgy brilliantly connecting two time levels. A clever equivocalness of events deciding the course of events in the once ordinary and pleasant family. The play takes place in the 1960ies: The mother is incurably ill and uses her upcoming death as her yardstick for an evaluation of the family and the home. A group of strangers move in upstairs. This triggers a situation of cruelty and simulated normality. The daughter runs away from the mother’s influence and marries one of the strangers. After 40 years, she returns to the flat with her youngest son, sick and divorced, and is now brutally reminded of her mother’s fate. She cannot, and will not prevent the next generation from repeating her own escapades. Perhaps the child will manage completely differently. As often seen in Belbel, the melodrama is simultaneously a farce. The fascinating aspect of the play is the double casting of all the leading roles, which courageously joins character stories from three generations together.
