In the ashes of democracy’s highest court, history repeats itself in fire, blood, and ruin.
“Seldom does a choreographer speak out as strongly as Andrew Skeels.”
—Die Rheinpfalz
Burning of Jamestown
Named 2025 Show of the Year by National Theater Mannheim Tanz, Burning of Jamestown is a searing dance-theater work that confronts the collapse of American democracy with unflinching intensity—marking a major milestone in Andrew Skeels’ artistic trajectory.
Through visceral choreography and stark theatrical imagery, the piece exposes the violence, corruption, and systemic decay that have come to define a nation in crisis.
Inspired by Bacon’s Rebellion—the first uprising on American soil—the work draws a piercing line between past and present, revealing how cycles of political unrest, inequality, and institutional failure reverberate across centuries.
The action unfolds in a dystopian vision of the U.S. Supreme Court, burned and left in ruins. Within this fractured landscape, iconic symbols of American history are stripped bare and reimagined in disturbing new forms: George Washington brandishing a Colt revolver; Supreme Court justices locked in a ruthless struggle for survival; and crimson drapery—once emblematic of power and dignity—reduced to tattered remnants, repurposed as instruments of control and execution. Each image lingers as a haunting portrait of a democracy consuming itself.
Fusing cinematic staging, bold physicality, and uncompromising political urgency, Burning of Jamestown embodies Andrew Skeels’ signature artistic voice—precise, visceral, and deeply engaged with the moral tensions of our time. It is not merely a performance, but an indictment, a requiem, and a call to reckon with the forces that threaten to extinguish liberty.
—tanznet.de
“Burning of Jamestown is not a narrative ballet. No story is retold here—instead, themes are danced. And danced in a language that is rich in every sense of the word. Rarely does one see such a wide-ranging and meaningful movement vocabulary so confidently employed.”
“When political activists package their message in stage art, it can sometimes seem like moral recognition matters more to them than artistic merit—but not so with the much-awarded choreographer Andrew Skeels. The American-born artist, now based in Canada, delivers with his latest work The Burning of Jamestown a stunning example of a history lesson in U.S. politics, which he uses as the foundation for a choreographically powerful commentary on the current political moment.”
—tanznet.de
“We see the pillars of the Supreme Court. The central pillar is broken; two golden rifles form a cross above its ruins. The red curtains are burned; corruption has hollowed out the system of “checks and balances,” the principle of separation of powers at the heart of the American Constitution. In the middle of this post-apocalyptic scene, a revolving platform spins, inexorably driving victims toward the bloodstained hands of the highest judges and the unrestrained political elites who appointed them.”
—Mannheimer Morgen
Premiering on April 25, 2025, at the National Theater Mannheim, Burning of Jamestown was performed through July 23, 2025, in NTM’s temporary Kino Franklin theater—an ex-American military cinema on an abandoned U.S. base in Mannheim, Germany. The irony of staging this uncompromising vision of American democracy in flames on the very grounds of America’s former military presence abroad cannot be overstated. Within the charred pillars of a dystopian Supreme Court, the work found an even deeper resonance.
Burning of Jamestown (2025)
Credits
Creative Team
Choreography – Andrew Skeels
Music – Antoine Seychal
Assistant Choreographers – Jean-Sébastien Couture, Nicolas Grosclaude
Stage & Costume Design – Damian Siqueiros
Lighting Design – Andrew Skeels
Dramaturgy – Joe De Paul, David Di Giovanni
Costume Collaboration – Julia Headley
Video – Valeria Lampadova, Robert Becker
Artists of National Theater Mannheim
Lorenzo Angelini
Joseph Caldo
Leonardo Cheng
Arianna Di Francesco
Shaun Patrick Ferren
Paloma Galiana Moscardó
Jessica Liu
Natsuho Matsumoto
Nicola Prato
Noa Siluvangi
Dora Stepusin
Reiko Tan
Luis Tena Torres
Anna Zardi