Alle Toten fliegen hoch 1 – 3

That the actor Joachim Meyerhoff is a great escapologist is something everyone knows who has seen him and his considerable delight in transformation and physical intensity on stage. His evolving solo project at the Vienna Burgtheater “Alle Toten fliegen hoch” [All The Dead Fly Up] proves that he is also a brilliant author, gifted with a form of black humour which is both acute and warm. The Burgtheater actor has put the first three parts, which he developed during the course of the 2007/2008 season, together into a single five-hour performance, an uninhibited mythomanic séance of family memories. The actor Meyerhoff tells us about his life, while simultaneously acting it out, illuminating the depths of his family history with brilliant wit. That his is no ordinary family can be deduced from the title which is a reference to the children’s game “All The Birds Fly Up.” One of Meyerhoff’s aunts gave the game a macabre twist in order to teach the children in this extensive family to be able to tell the difference between the living and the dead. The relatives who were dead, were allowed to “fly up”, while for the living the children kept their hands down. Ultimately all three parts of Meyerhoff’s marathon are concerned with the experiences of death and loss and his efforts to save himself by telling the story: a death cult lived out to excess, a captivating performance and one of the funniest and most touching performances of the season.