Good Cooking

The nerves are raw: Gay marriage, immigration, organic produce, Euro crisis, feminism – hot-button issues, which not only inflame dinner conversations and online forums. On one side we hear the admonitions of the politically correct, while the other side reacts in dissent: “This is our freedom of expression!” Within this hotchpotch of constant indignation, Plenty of Good Eats is the soliloquy of an Everyman as he is preparing the finest ingredients into a multi-course dinner (another one of these fads) for his wife and son. White, heterosexual, bourgeois, healthy, and in the prime of his years, he never lived quite up to his professional expectations, did not quite have the family he hoped for, and now his neighbourhood is being gentrified and will most likely become unaffordable soon. He is just a frightfully normal “loser” who by birthright seemed to be destined to win. Sibylle Berg makes him gripe, grieve, and grumble about the state of our society, accompanied by a male chorus that expresses the “voice of the people” while turning increasingly unpleasant, if not downright reactionary.