FIRST MAN

• Date:
• Time: 20:00
• Location: Theater aan het Spui, Den Haag

This event takes place in Dutch.

What if your child asks you whether their family will be deported? What if you realize that not only you, but also the next generation must ask themselves: do I really belong here? Theatre maker and master storyteller Sadettin Kırmızıyüz opens his new series A Sort of Dutchman with FIRST MAN, a personal and poignant solo performance about how identity passes from generation to generation. With humor, vulnerability, and sharp social observations, he explores how the traumas and dreams of one generation influence the next, and whether a migration background ever truly stops being an obstacle.

The day after the parliamentary elections of 2023, Sadettin stands in the kitchen with his ten-year-old son. Because of the election victory of the PVV, he is afraid that his grandparents will be deported because they are Muslim. Sadettin reassures his teenage son, despite his own worries:
"We belong here, even if our last name doesn’t sound Dutch. Even if we come from a Muslim family. Whatever happens, we are staying here."
The son, the first Kırmızıyüz of mixed descent, goes to bed comforted that evening. Sadettin, the parent, lies awake all night.

How did we get here? After years in which Sadettin himself was confronted with xenophobia and discrimination, is his ten-year-old son now facing the same thing? In the Kırmızıyüz family, several languages are spoken. Christmas, Ramadan, Easter, Eid al-Adha, and Sinterklaas are all celebrated by everyone. When politicians talk about an integration problem among people with a migration background, Sadettin doesn’t have to feel addressed. They’re

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