PEER / BITCH is Henriette Pedersen and Runa Borch Skolseg’s matriarchal shout-out to the national epos Peer Gynt. PEER / BITCH moves the action forward 151 years, allowing the lead actors to switch gender and explore a structurally differential treatment when it comes to who is allowed to behave like an asshole. Perhaps the most unsympathetic protagonist of Norwegian drama is little interested in subjugating the norms of society, but how is sex and sexuality rooted in Ibsen’s text.
“I am no easy bitch from the village,” PEER BITCH says. The performance allows an unstoppable depression, rage and bodily desire to overrun Ibsen’s structures and invite the audience into a cathartic and liberating circular dance.
Choreographer Henriette Pedersen has worked at the intersection between theater, dance and visual art since 2000. Questions related to gender, sexuality and power structures consistently run through her work, and also i PEER / BITCH. Runa Borch Skolseg is a playwright and author, maximalist and feminist.
