Andrev Walden's coming-of-age story about a son who gets new "fathers" when his mother has different relationships in her wandering life is a beloved book that was awarded the August Prize in 2023.
Although Shanti Roney had not read the novel when he was asked to stage the play at the Scalateatern in Stockholm, he now pays tribute to it and the author Andrev Walden.
It's a dark story about a very tough upbringing. But it's portrayed with a lot of humor and he's very good at formulating situations and such funny observations of details when things are at their worst, which makes it still very funny.
Recognition
One of the fathers of the boy in "Damn Men" can be called the Plant Magician - a hippie-like figure, a type that Shanti Roney himself recognizes from his upbringing in a collective in Skåne in the 1970s.
There were a lot of people like that, with those kinds of theories about how to live an alternative life when you were little, he says, laughing.
Even though this takes place a little later than my own upbringing, it also depicts the 1980s, which was my youth.
“A nightmare”
Shanti Roney has played many roles in his career and most recently played “Hamlet” at the Dramaten. But this will be the first time he has performed a monologue in a one-man show.
"Yes, it was time now, before I retire," says the 55-year-old.
It's fun to throw yourself into things that you don't really know if you can do.
But it has been a challenge for him to memorize all the text.
It's been a nightmare. At first I thought it wouldn't work. Can you learn that much text by heart? But it works somehow, he says,
"Damn Men" premieres at the Scalateatern in Stockholm on January 22nd.
