Nursing home, Barbara T’Jonck, Jana De Kockere, Martha Balthazar and Mats Vandroogenbroeck

Old age does not come alone. It comes with remembering and forgetting. With pride and fear. With fellow sufferers and loneliness. Today, also with waiting lists, indexations, shareholders, staff shortages, and quite a lot of medication. And it comes with time: whoever has enough birthdays, does not escape it. Rustoord (Rest Home) is documentary theater about elderly care today. Through interviews with the elderly, caregivers, gerontologists, politicians, investors, etc., the makers investigate the ‘why’ of the long corridors in residential care centers, the bittersweet aftertaste of centrally organized care policy in a neoliberal framework, and the tension between care, freedom, and disciplining. Above all, Rustoord is a coming of age; an imagination exercise about what it could mean to grow old, if we weren’t so afraid of it. Four actors of different generations (Mats Vandroogenbroeck, Barbara T’Jonck, Mark Verstraete, and Mieke Verdin) embody these different perspectives, to offer not an answer, but an insight into the complex knot that elderly care is today. “Rustoord is a candy-colored but rock-hard statement about elderly care.” Els Van Steenberghe - Focus Knack creation Barbara T’Jonck, Jana De Kockere, Martha Balthazar, and Mats Vandroogenbroeck - acting Barbara T’Jonck, Mats Vandroogenbroeck, Mieke Verdin, and Mark Verstraete - scenography and costume design and lighting support Manuela Vilanova - sound Tom Van den Brande - lighting design Ellie Bryce - scenography and costume assistant Carly Rae Heathcote - realization scenography KVS atelier team Carly Rae Heathcote, Manuela Vilanova - costume execution Carly Rae Heathcote, NTGent atelier team, Manuela Vilanova - image Alice Dooreman - technical support Caroline Wagner and Noé Dervaux - production management creation Ella De Gregoriis - production management tour Bas Blaasse / Oihana Azpillaga - technique tour Emma De Munck / Marthe Leon Thys / Lucas Van de Voorde - production Forever Stew - co-production KVS, NTGent, C-Mine, De Grote Post - partners KVS, NTGent, Perpodium vzw, CC De Ploter, CM Gezondheidsfonds, Vormingscentrum Destelheide - with the support of the Vlaamse Overheid