International New Theatre Week
August 18–22 of 2020, the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre (LMTA) presents the international theatre project that will feature five premieres of young artists graduating this year: Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė, Naubertas Jasinskas, Lina Židonytė, Augustas Gornatkevičius and Antanas Obcarskas.
Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė, Naubertas Jasinskas, Lina Židonytė, Augustas Gornatkevičius (© D. Matvejev), Antanas Obcarskas (© D. Matvejev)
Tuesday, 18 August 2020 at 6 PM
Wednesday, 19 August 2020 at 6 PM
State Youth Theater Stage 99 (Arklių st. 5)
THE PHANTOM OF NORMALITY
Based on Saara Turunen’s play of the same title
“I have just one wish in life. And that is that I could be ordinary, just a normal person. And that my family would be ordinary too, just a normal family. That we wouldn’t stand out from the crowd, that we’d be ordinary, really, just normal.”
Saara Turunen’s play The Phantom of Normality (2016) explores the everyday life of typical Finnish families. It presents a gloomy take on family traditions, relationships, communication habits, secret desires, small and clichéd interpersonal issues and conflicts. In the center of the play are frigidity and short-sightedness toward one another.
Director Antanas Obcarskas: “Saara Tununen text quietly and disheartenedly buries the normal family and the last sincere person, while in the performance we find ourselves in the near future and bury the last family of bees. Human families are long gone from the surface of the earth. But could anything more normal than bees exist in nature? I cannot think of anything more ordinary. Unfortunately, I hardly resemble them, as the general political correctness prevents me from doing as little as stinging. The bees, despite being a perfectly independent, yet fragile organism, are going extinct. Family is a strong word but is as a concept becoming an increasingly rare occurrence in my environment. In the future presented in our performance, families are completely extinct and all is left of them is a bitter set of memories, recorded by the author of the play… I must ask: In the future, will one mock our rushed and resolute dissociation from each other? Why do we feel the urgency to return to our home and lock the door to be with only ourselves?”
Director: Antanas Obcarskas
Set Designer: Oscar Dempsey
Costume designer: Juozas Valenta
Cast: Ella Lymi, Carlos Orjuela, Jasir Osman, Nicklas Pohjola, Milla Tissari
Lighting designer: Teemu Nurmelin
Technical assistant in Lithuania: Dominykas Grinius
Tutors: directors Kristian Smeds and Yana Ross
Producers: Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, State Youth Theatre
Partners: Theatre Academy of Uniarts Helsinki, Nordic Drama Corner, Caffeine
Supporters: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, NordPlus
Special thanks to Vilnius Fencing Club coach Rimas Kalnutis
Duration: 1 hour 20 min.
Performed in Finnish with Lithuanian subtitles.
Smoke effects will be used during the performance.
* * *
Wednesday, 19 August 2020 at 8 PM
Thursday, 20 April 2020 at 10 PM
Bar Kablys + Club Concert Hall (Kauno st. 5)
REQUIEM FOR A WOMAN
Based on Orange Peel by Maja Pelević (N-16)
The European Gender Equality Index data by European Institute for Gender Equality announced on 15 October, 2019 indicate that since 2005 the Gender Equality Index in Lithuania has not increased but rather decreased by 0.3 points, and since 2015, the score decreased by 1.3, thus making Lithuania the only country in the EU where the field of gender equality has seen no progress.
The performance is based on the play by Maja Pelević that wasn‘t previously staged in Lithuania. It demonstrates the fragmented female journey, her transformation for a girl to a woman, from a woman to a mother, from a mother to a victim, etc. The main character is surrounded by archetypical, stereotypical and absurd people who live in a patriarchal world that is put in motion and sustained not only by men but also women who out of momentum, convenience or safety still believe in woman’s position as the weaker sex, as her position of being just a woman.
With the faltering of patriarchal model of the world, active women break out into all fields, but this process is still not meaningful enough to be represented in the statistics, and the feminist discourse is often rejected as an integral part of our natural reality. The performance suggests forgiveness to the woman and proposes rethinking the guilt that we put on her – for tasting the forbidden fruit, for condemning us all to suffer on earth as a consequence to her action, for being too active, too masculine, too strong, having cellulite, talking too loud or perhaps not wanting to bear children.
Director: Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė
Set Designer: Elžbieta Kvašytė
Composers: Marija Paškevičiūtė and Mindaugas Urbaitis
Costume designer: Liucija Kvašytė
Lighting designer: Vilius Vilutis
Assistant lighting designer: Valdas Latonas
Cast: Urður Bergsdóttir, Kristrún Kolbrúnardóttir, Björk Guðmundsdóttir and Fannar Arnarsson
Tutors: director Yana Ross, actress Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir, lecturer Snæbjörg Sigurgeirsdóttir
Technical assistant in Iceland: Egill Ingibersson
Technical assistant in Lithuania: Dominykas Grinius
Producers: Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, State Youth Theatre
Partner: Iceland University of the Arts, Caffeine
Supporters: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, Vilnius City Municipality, NordPlus
Duration: 1 hour 30 min.
Performed in English.
The audience will be moving around the space, there will be no seats. Smoke effects, loud music, foul language and nudity will be used during the performance.
* * *
Wednesday, 19 August 2020 at 10 PM
Thursday, 20 April 2020 at 8 PM
Musical Theatre Club Legendos (Kalvarijų st. 85)
CALAMARI UNION 2. MEGASTAR
Inspired by Aki Kaurismäki’s film Calamari Union
The performance is inspired by the movie Calamari Union created by the famous Finnish film director Aki Kaurismäki. It presents an absurd journey in the streets of Helsinki. A few men named Frank decide to travel from their residential area Kallio to the other end of the city, residential are Eira. These working class men, sympathizing with the beatnik movement, move from the industrial Kallio to the luxurious Eira in groups, hoping to find paradise there. The majority of Franks die during their travel through the city and only two Franks reach the desired coast. However, upon reaching Eira, they discover that the area is polluted and crowded with houses – they are too late.
Calamari Union 2. Megastar is to some extent the second part of the movie and the version of such journey today. In the performance, these characters’ children are trying to come back, as, according to their dads, life is more colorful and fulfilling there. The children of working class men grew up in a liberal, increasingly progressive world but now they feel unhappy for living conditions are too reliable; They seek for entertainment, dirt and adventures. The journey however takes an unexpected turn when it turns out that the ship sails not only through space but also through time. Eira, at the end of Kaurismäki’s film, does not meet the Franks’ expectations. Nowadays, we call it gentrification – cities and its parts change appearance and people who created an authentic vibe of the place are urged out of their home by those more solvent, more influential members of society. The performance offers to consider opportunities of the gentrification of ideas. Would we find what we expected if we came back to wherever we wanted to?
Director: Augustas Gornatkevičius
Cast: Ola Blick, Roderick Kabanga, Eeva Kaihola, Eeva Mäkinen, Tuuli Paju
Set and Costume designer: Simona Davlidovičiūtė
Composer: Jokūbas Tulaba
Lighting designer: Julius Kuršis
Lighting assistant: Augtumas Danielius Harner
Dramatist: Anni Ihlberg
Video projection author: Laurynas Valkiūnas
Technical assistant in Lithuania: Dominykas Grinius
Tutors: directors Kristian Smeds and Yana Ross
Producers: Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, State Youth Theatre
Partners: Theatre Academy of Uniarts Helsinki, Caffeine
Supporters: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, NordPlus, Supernormal
Duration: 1 hour 20 min.
Performed in English.
Smoke effects will be used during the performance.
* * *
Thursday, 20 August 2020 at 6 PM
Friday, 21 April 2020 at 8 PM
LMTA Balcony Theatre (Gedimino av. 42)
JACKIE
Inspired by Elfriede Jelinek’s play of the same title
How often do you think about death? The death of your neighbors, relatives or bypassers? What about your own death? Do you give thought to what does life look in the afterlife? What will you meet there? How will you look?
This performance is an attempt to create an illusion of life after death. It is based on the play “Jackie” by the Austrian novelist and dramaturg Elfriede Jelinek which tells a story of a woman who was observed by the public: her gestures, mannerisms and actions were widely discussed and commented in the media, her image formed fashion and culture trends as well as the so-called good taste. The play uses biographical facts to reveal the woman’s inner feelings, experiences and their consequences when she was put under a magnifying glass and people knew and engaged in the stories of her husband’s adventures with other women, her miscarriage, the traps setup by her husband‘s family, etc.
Society’s pressure caused Jackie stress, fear and anxiety. It crammed her into a role that she tried to fulfill in the fear of tainting her husband’s well-crafted image and status as well as hoping to uphold the portrait of the youngest First Lady – Jacqueline Kennedy.
Despite the fact that the dramaturgy of the performance unveils the story of a well-renowned woman, we are interested in what do we take from it? How important is one‘s status or position on this Earth, how important is our work and health that we sell or just give away. What is left after us?
This performance does not reflect reality. We strived to create a fiction and an illusion. The artistic team based their creative research on various comments, personal experiences, inspirations, metaphors, imagination and fantasy.
Director: Lina Židonytė
Cast: Alex Anton, Tuulia Eloranta, Denisa Snyder
Set and costume designers: Larisa Jasinskaja, Marina Jasinskaja
Composers: Vytautas Leistrumas, Marius Repšys
Script consultant ViskasYraKitaip
Stage movement coordinator Judita Urnikytė
Video projection: Nidas Kaniušas, Justinas Piliponis
Lighting designer: Vilius Vilutis
Assistant Lighting designer: Valdas Latonas
Technical assistant in Lithuania: Dominykas Grinius
Tutors: directors Kristian Smeds and Yana Ross
Producers: Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, State Youth Theatre
Partners: Theatre Academy of Uniarts Helsinki, LRT, Rowohlt Theater Verlag, Caffeine
Supporters: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, NordPlus
Duration: 1 hour 30 min.
Performed in English.
* * *
Saturday, 22 August 2020 at 2 PM
Saturday, 22 August 2020 at 8 PM
LMTA Theater Manufactury (T. Kosciuškos st. 10)
THE PELICAN (N–14)
Based on August Strindberg’s play of the same title
August Strindberg’s late work – the collection of Chamber plays – consists of four plays created for the Intima Teater in 1907 – Thunder in the Air, The Burnt Side, The Ghost Sonata and The Pelican. In the chamber plays playwright shifts the action weight of drama from superficial to the most refined circumstances, reminiscent the existence of metaphysical laws – powerful actions beyond the physical limits of the action of the drama. The playwright is also developing a new model through which he intends to communicate the prospects of people’s lives in a different way.
Pelican examines the perception of the world as a network of illusions and lies, analyzes the personal and environmental events of the characters, which determine the desire to live not in the present and future, but in the image of an idealized past. Family – formation and development of this social construct – is analyzed in detail. The performance analyzes and questions the concept of family necessity, offering the idea that every generation inherits the worst qualities from their predecessors. It can be perceived as the cause of a network of illusions and lies. These processes form the medium for the meaningless development of everyday existence, as if falling into an endless cycle. The never-ending wheel spins, accelerates and leads to a dubious future.
Director: Naubertas Jasinskas
Cast: Alvydė Pikturnaitė, Aurelijus Pocius, Kipras Mašidlauskas, Deividas Batavičius, Saulius Ambrozaitis
Voice: Kristupas Sabolius
Set designers: random heroes
Costume designer: Lina Židonytė
Composer: Diopo Ndugu
Video projection author: Kornelijus Jaroševičius
Light designer: Dainius Urbonis
Sound director: Dominykas Grinius
Video assistant: Dinas Marcinkevičius
Light assistant: Martynas Vaitkevičius
Technical assistant in Lithuania: Dominykas Grinius
Technical assistant in Iceland: Egill Ingibersson
Tutors: directors Kristian Smeds and Yana Ross, actress Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir, lecturer Snæbjörg Sigurgeirsdóttir
Producers: Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, State Youth Theatre
Partners: Iceland University of the Arts, Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, Caffeine
Supporters: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania, NordPlus
Duration: 1 hour 45 min.
Performed in English.
Smoke effects, strobe lights, disturbing images and foul language will be used during the performance.