Year Zero is a bitter-sweet satire on Vichy France using the popular music of the period to lampoon many of the attitudes of the Petainist French. Year Zero is inspired by interviews conducted in the north of France, where communists, Gaulists, collaborators and witnesses to head shaving ceremonies provided the original source material.

Year Zero is directly inspired by those whose youth was touched by the Nazi occupation. The play exposes the day to day experiences of the men and women who suffered or profited from those zero years.

Year Zero asks some sharp questions about France’s wartime history. With her French ensemble, Julia Pascal presents her British, French, German and Jewish cultural influences through text, cabaret, music and dance

Reviews

“The company perform with immense verve and minimal props, used with dazzling versatility. . .
. . . this show is physical theatre with a strong moral and political charge”
The Stage

Production History

Year Zero is published in Crossing Jerusalem & Other Plays available to purchase from Bloomsbury

Premiered in 1994 Maubege Festival
1995 Cambridge Junction
Director: Julia Pascal
Design and Choreography: Thomas Kampe
Lighting: Ian Watts
Sound: Colin Brown