The company produced its first performance in collaboration with Trøndelag Teater in 1989, and was established as an independent group in 1992.
In 2002, the theater company received support from the Norwegian Arts Council to launch its own performing space in Hausmania.
The Theatre of Cruelty is inspired by Antonin Artaud's ideas of a double and physical theater, where the body's musical breathing and expressions are actions meant to generate deconstruction and retheatralisation.
[3] Notably, the group produced the world premiere of Henrik Ibsen's incomplete prosaic comedy Svanhild (1860) on 14 March 2014.
[4][5] The group also produced the world premiere of Henrik Ibsen's unfinished opera libretto The Mountain Bird (1859) on 18 April 2009.