Marlene Monteiro Freitas

In her new work ›NÔT‹ - after the Cape Verdean Creolean term for ›night‹ - Marlene Monteiro Freitas takes the audience to an enchanted place where art becomes a tool for survival. 

Inspired by the fairy tales of 1001 Nights, she deliberately breaks with classic narrative styles: Scheherazade survives by translating the energy of the constantly interrupted, interwoven sequence of stories into movement. She transforms the stage into a space in which opposites collide: life and death, vice and virtue, dream and reality. Masks resembling those in the Cape Verdean carnival, mechanical movements and live percussion all combine to produce a unique performance with a haunting aesthetic. 

Marlene Monteiro Freitas, who, together with Florentina Holzinger, will take on the artistic co-direction Berlin's Volksbühne in 2026, is famous for her works, which are as rigorously formal as they are expressive and for which she has received the Silver Lion at the Venice Biennale, among other awards.

Choreography Marlene Monteiro Freitas Assistant Choreography Francisco Rolo With Ben Green, Henri “Cookie” Lesguillier, Joãozinho da Costa, Mariana Tembe, Marie Albert, Miguel Filipe, Rui Paixão, Tomás Moital Set design Yannick Fouassier, MMF Light, Technical Management Yannick Fouassier Costume MMF, Marisa Escaleira Sound Rui Antunes Stage management Ana Luísa Novais Special Space Props Cláudio Silva Set Design Internship Emma Ait-Kaci Artistic Consultancy João Figueira, Martin Valdés-Stauber Production P.OR.K Distribution Key Performance 

Coproduction Festival d’Avignon, Berliner Festspiele, International Summer Festival Kampnagel, MC2: Maison de la Culture de Grenoble - Scène nationale, Le Quartz - Scène Nationale de Brest, La Comédie de Clermont- Ferrand scène nationale, Maison de la danse, Lyon – Pôle européen de creation, La Comédie de Genève & La Bâtie-Festival de Genève, Teatro Municipal do Porto, Kunstenfestivaldesarts, PACT Zollverein Residenzen O Espaço do Tempo, Alkantara, OPART, E.P.E./ESTÚDIOS VICTOR CÓRDON, Onassis AiR, MC2: Maison de la Culture de Grenoble - Scène nationale, International Summer Festival Kampnagel Institutionally supported by Dançando com a Diferença Acknowledgement Carlos Duarte, Atelier MC2 Grenoble The dramaturgical research of NÔT was supported by Onassis AiR in 2025.