Forever Young  

The song drama Forever Young (2007) written by a Swiss writer and musician Erik Gedeon (1963) came about from a very successful project performed in Hamburg Thalia Vista Social Club (2001). The first Slovenian production of Gedeon's worldwide hit was put on the Maribor stage in an adapted version of content and dramaturgy by a German-Bosnian-Austrian director and musician Sandy Lopičić.  

The drama is set in 2065. A group of actors, former members of the Maribor Drama Theatre return to the times of their youth, which was the time when they were all performers at the theatre, by singing the evergreens, making us all confront the everyday lives of the elderly who are stuck in time. We see them reviving their brain through music therapy, recalling the long lost vitality and thereby extending their lives.  

Anyone with at least some social sense knows that we live in a world where everything that was once considered normal is falling apart. In today's society one only counts for something if they are young, successful in all areas, if they constantly climbing the social ladder and earns a lot of money; to be old and/or ill equals complete desperation, powerlessness, loss, failure, so something that we should be ashamed of and hide from others. Gerontophobia is therefore becoming the basic norm in our society. Old age is beginning to be considered as an illness, a disability which must be eliminated, which is the result of a materialistic society and a consumerist way of life. In this kind of a society only vitality, speed, physical strength, sexy looks, success and profit is what counts. Today it is very difficult to be old or ill as old age and illness make a person stigmatised not only physically and emotionally, but also mentally and socially. The society or the public, especially the media which covers the public sphere do not appreciate the old and the ill as they are a reminder of the vulnerability and transience of life (fragility and mortality) thus spoiling the image of eternal growth and happiness. At first glance, the performance is entertaining, fun and relaxing, but looking at it a little closer, a story about the helpless old people with quite radical messages is revealed.