This is the story of the most successful and longest-lived micronation in the world. And it is the story of the Bates family, whose members began as pirates and became princes.
It’s the 1960s and the BBC has slept through the social upheaval: it doesn’t play pop music on any of its stations. In order to supply the youth of the kingdom with rock ‘n’ roll, pirate radio stations sprout from the seabed. Outside British territorial waters and beyond the reach of the censorship authorities, radio pirates occupy abandoned World War II anti-aircraft platforms and set up their transmitter masts there. Among them are Joan and Roy Bates. Together with their children Penny and Michael, they move to the old sea fortress Fort Roughs in the middle of the North Sea. But while the parents run the radio for the advertising revenue, Penny is concerned with freedom and Michael with family cohesion. Eventually, (even) the (stolid) BBC understands and reforms its radio program. Many pirate DJs, tired of canned food and lashing waters, move to the safe mainland. Deprived of their business, the Bates devise a solution: without further ado, they declare their flak platform a state and the Principality of Sealand is born.
But the conflicts deepen: while the parents dream of a tax haven for letterbox companies, Penny longs for a revolutionary form of government. When a windy German businessman shows up and offers the entry of a multi-million dollar cartel, things spiral out of control.
COMPOSITION/ARRANGEMENTS Christopher Verworner/Misha Cvijović TEXT Lars Werner/Fabian Gerhardt DIRECTOR/SONG TEXT Fabian Gerhardt MUSICAL DIRECTION Christopher Verworner/Misha Cvijović CHOREOGRAPHY Chris Jäger DRAMATRAPHY Bernhard Glocksin STAGE Sabrina Rossetto COSTUME Sophie Peters
WITH Steffi Dietrich, Sophia Euskirchen, Lucille-Mareen Mayr, Owen Read, Meik van Severen, Mathilda Switala, Armin Wahedi Yeganeh and the musicians Misha Cvijović, Philip Dornbusch, Benjamin Geier, Sven Holscher, Sabrina Ma, Jakob Roters, Fabian Sackis, Christopher Verworner
Shows with English subtitles on 26/27/29 January 2023 and 2/4/15/23 February
Stroboscopic effects are used in this production. Certain strobe frequencies may cause epileptic seizures.