Monster Truck

I feel Nothing

I FEEL NOTHING
A monologue by Monster Truck

Shortly before his plane landed at the airport of Teheran on the eve of the Iranian revolution, a reporter asked the revolutionary leader Ayatollah Khomeini what his feelings were now that after 15 years of exile he would once again set foot on Iranian soil. Khomeini only replied with “Nothing. I feel nothing.” When it comes to their own feelings, the powerful are known to be reserved. Whether revolutionary leader or executive in a company, the commandment of one’s own emotions seems to be absolutely vital when it comes to forcing one’s own will on others. Where premodern power once furiously and martially raged, contemporary power appears reserved, even relaxed. Self-control has become a tool for controlling others. Yet in theatre we still strive for those “grand emotions”, their presence still necessary for the putative credibility of the performance. In a culture that otherwise has a tendency towards the anesthesia of feelings, theatre still provides a space for the longing to actively put oneself into a situation to be passively touched.

I FEEL NOTHING is about the power of emotions and about the emotions of the powerful. As the first part in a series about “Dictators”, for the Monologfestival Monster Truck take on the Iranian revolutionary leader Chomeini and, in a maximum of identification, enter into the depths of one’s own phantasms of world domination and autocracy.