For the performance Family, theatre‑maker Louis Janssens invited four performers of different ages onto the stage to share what life at home was like for them. How people talked, and which things were especially not talked about. What the actors say, you can immediately picture. The moments of real connection, the awkward conversations, the emotional unavailability of a parent, the intimacy with a sister, brother or grandmother. There are painful memories among them, but everything is kept light, and often humorous, through the way the performers tell their stories. A joy to listen to. It is about absent fathers, about missing a mother who has died, about the loneliness of children who want to share their greatest secret but don’t dare to. One by one, the actors take the floor. And now they are being listened to, by their fellow performers and by the audience.

What the five actors share is their queerness. They all talk about how they shared this news, one at a very young age, the other much later. For none of them it came easily. And without the performers constantly responding to one another, the strong sense of being together is moving. In fact, they create a new family together, one they have chosen themselves.

For ten years, Louis Janssens made theatre with the duo DeSnor. The decision to start telling his personal stories led to overwhelmingly beautiful, intimate productions. The last three: his solo Serenade, his performance Analoog (with company De Hoe) and his previous group creation Desire, were all selected for the Theatre Festival, belonging to the best theatre of that season.