How one comes to theatre studies
— You love theatre very much, but you also love cinema. Why, out of the various art forms, did you choose theatre studies in particular?
— First of all, it’s childhood impressions. My mother told me that as a child we went to “The Magic Flute” at the Minsk Opera Theatre. The opera is complex and long; my mother herself dozed off, but waking up, she was amazed that the child was watching the stage with both eyes, unable to look away. So inner preferences were there already.
Theatre is close to me because living actors perform in front of me, and you can catch the subtlest nuances. I can go to the same production ten times, and each time it will be a new discovery. Theatre is a very living art that responds strongly to social and political events. It can be different: you can see something entertaining, or you can plunge into existential things, look inside yourself and discover something through a theatrical metaphor.
— But surely much of that can be applied to cinema too?
— Undoubtedly. As a child I even had some filming experience. I was told to jump off the stove and shout “mummy, mummy!”. I jumped, shouted, with tears in my eyes. After the take the actors even started to comfort me, deciding that I was really upset. But I wasn’t upset at all: I was told to shout, so I shouted.
But I ended up in theatre studies, as often happens, by chance. I wanted to get a higher education, but for a long time I couldn’t decide. First I applied to the Institute of Foreign Languages — I still love foreign languages — but I only got a place on the paid track, and there was no way to pay. I finished a secretary-assistant course and got a job as a typist in the office of the Academy of Arts. The team there was wonderful. The office was next to the departments, and the head of department, Vyachaslau Siarheevich, once said to me: “Why will you sit here all the time? Right now there’s an intake for theatre studies — it happens rarely, once every five years. Write a review, let’s see what comes of it.” I gave it a try.
Before that I wasn’t an avid theatregoer. I only remembered school trips to the theatre and that as a child I liked the ballet “The Nutcracker”. At the colloquium, when they asked what I had seen, I could only recall those children’s shows — I hardly impressed the committee with my answers back then.
The competition was big, the group that came together was strong. I didn’t get onto the free track, but I was promised: if you study with top marks, you’ll be transferred. I set myself a goal and got only nines and tens. Already in the second semester I paid less, and from the second year I studied for free. My passion for theatre wasn’t pre-programmed; I realised this love after the fact, when I plunged deep into my studies, when we began going to productions on our student cards almost every day and discussing them endlessly.
— Didn’t you want to transfer to acting or theatre management, as students often do?
— No, there were no such thoughts. Although in the first year we had acting, directing, and stage speech. But theatre won out precisely on the research side. My father says I’m an observer by nature. I really do love to observe. If there had been an intake for film criticism then, perhaps chance would have carried me there. But I’m glad I stayed in theatre. With Belarusian cinema everything is much more complicated than with Belarusian theatre. I very much wanted to work specifically with Belarusian art, to develop and elevate the national. I saw it as a mission, as service. People around often said: “Belarusian theatre? Who needs it, you won’t get rich on that.” And I thought: “Who, if not me?” Even during my doctoral defence, when it wasn’t easy, that thought kept me going: who will do this if not me? At the very least, I’ll do it honestly.
Professional identity and the path into theatre criticism
— At the “Dramatyzacyja” festival you were introduced as a “theatre researcher.” How do you identify yourself in the profession, and has anything changed in emigration?
— Sometimes I call myself a theatre scholar, sometimes a theatre researcher. My academic degree and title helped me to emigrate. Professionally, in emigration there’s been more administrative work, though I already had that experience when I worked as head of the literary department at the Youth Theatre (documentation, coordination, minutes).
— When did you feel yourself to be a theatre critic specifically?
— At our Academy two powerful disciplines were taught: theatre studies and theatre criticism. I believe a theatre scholar can be a good critic, but the reverse is harder. Our course master expected publications in the media from us every semester. While still a student I published in the magazine “Mastactva” (a great stroke of luck for a student), in the newspapers “LiM” and “Kultura”, and in non-specialist outlets like “Minsk and Its Residents”.
I came to criticism in earnest somewhat later than to scholarship. When I was writing my dissertation, I concentrated on research and there was no time left for criticism. But criticism is a separate path. For people to invite you to write reviews, you have to establish yourself in the field, because a theatre scholar is not a profession about being public. At some point I decided to become more visible precisely as a critic: I started with Facebook posts, then became a columnist at the newspaper “Belarusians and the Market”, where I did interviews and pieces based on round tables. I enjoyed it very much, until the newspaper changed editors and cut its policy on culture.
Our theatrical life was Minsk-centric, but I was lucky to be a member of the expert council of the National Theatre Award twice, in the puppetry section. It was a great experience: we found and highlighted those who weren’t obvious contenders for the award but were doing extraordinary things. I began to be personally invited onto the juries of regional festivals — “March-Contact”, “White Tower”, the Dunin-Marcinkievich Festival. It was gratifying that critics of the younger generation began to be invited. It was important to me to defend my opinion. I thought more progressively than some older colleagues with traditional tastes, and it was a victory for me when, at the National Award, we managed to vote for experimental directors. It was important to make visible the work of the teams I believed in — even if they weren’t yet perfect, something living pulsed in them.
Recognition was also built up through public lectures (I gave my first thanks to Art Corporation). I liked that role; I planned to travel to European festivals. That eventually happened, but already in emigration: I attended “The Divine Comedy” in Kraków, “Sirenos” in Vilnius, a festival in Klaipėda. Incidentally, at “The Divine Comedy”, after the events of 2020, a separate programme was created for Belarusians on a wave of solidarity, where we gave talks.
— Which genres in theatre criticism are closest to you?
— I love doing interviews. But the actual process of writing reviews I don’t like, though I like the result. In general, writing is not my favourite part of the profession. I don’t even remember the last time I wrote a classic review of one specific production: as a researcher I find that genre a bit cramped. I find it more interesting to analyse an event as a whole — a festival, for example.
For example, at “Dramatyzacyja” five readings were shown. I can examine them through the prism of analysing the plays and the staging solutions, and develop that into a study of the staged reading as a phenomenon. In the Belarusian émigré milieu the staged reading has become a leading genre — it’s quick and cheap to produce, and I find it interesting to observe its evolution.
Writing a response to a production isn’t hard — there authors usually go through the plot-and-theme line, the acting, and share personal impressions. In such responses you rarely encounter a deep analysis of artistic imagery. A review, however, is hard, because without reconstructing and analysing the artistic imagery of a production it simply cannot exist.
Teaching in Belarus and Lithuania: European liberal arts
— You taught in Minsk, and now you teach at a university in Lithuania. What is the difference in approaches?
— The specifics depend on the audience. With theatre scholars it’s always more interesting — they’re people of your profession, you communicate almost as equals, you can give them lectures of high complexity. Actors and directors don’t need such theatre-scholarly depth of theatre history; they have other tasks, though I always demanded that actors be intelligent, well-read and profound. Working on a master’s programme is even more fascinating; there you can rely on the students’ practical background: for example, young men and women from Kazakhstan who had already worked as producers presented case studies themselves and explained to their peers how the industry works. We had to invent our own teaching methods; ready-made course descriptions often didn’t exist.
In Europe I compose the course programmes myself. Besides lectures, with the acting students we do a lot of practical work. In the first year they choose plays from the 20th–21st centuries and prepare excerpts — this year we took on the most difficult absurdism of Ionesco and Beckett and showed the work to the teachers. In the third year we practise reading by roles — actors adore it.
One of my favourite European courses is “Language and Thinking.” There was nothing like it at the Academy of Arts. It’s an introductory course in the humanities for first-years: they learn to read serious texts consciously, to understand them and to set out their own thoughts. Most come from Belarusian schools; they’re a little constrained, they weren’t taught to be bold in expressing themselves. They’re surprised that in the humanities there often are no “correct” and “incorrect” answers: if you have a position — argue it and prove it.
This course gives enormous pedagogical freedom. For instance, I felt like taking the students out of the classroom. We went to the riverbank in the Bernardine Garden, and they publicly read Hamlet’s monologue in different languages, comparing the translations. It’s an excellent training in boldness in front of strangers: passers-by didn’t look at them as fools but smiled and showed interest. And when we were studying Camus and his “The Myth of Sisyphus”, we climbed on foot up Gediminas’ Tower so the students could physically feel what it was like for poor Sisyphus to roll a stone uphill. At the top they read monologues they had written for Sisyphus at different stages of his path and reflected in essays on what he is thinking. For many first-years who had only recently arrived in Vilnius, it was also a beautiful introduction to the city. In this course the very idea of freedom is embodied — the concept of liberal arts.
Which theatre matters today: pain, catharsis and Belarusian identity
— What do you keep loving theatre for?
— I’d like to say jokingly: out of inertia, like lovers who have lived together a long time and grown used to each other. But that’s too simple an answer. Theatre changes, we change, but we keep finding points of contact. It’s love, not just cohabitation under one roof.
When 2020 came, many representatives of theatrical Belarus spoke out against what was happening, and I was in solidarity with them. Because of that understanding of the conditions they found themselves in, for a long time I couldn’t, and often still can’t, find the strength in myself to criticise their creative work in emigration, even when something doesn’t satisfy me. They do theatre in spite of everything, they survive, and they are tremendously brave.
But when I see something truly extraordinary among the émigré projects, I remember what I love theatre for in the first place. For example, Dzivakou’s work at “Blizki Vskhod”. The wonderful reading of the play “Bees in the Throat” directed by Natasha Levanava at “Druga Próba”. Mikita Ilyinchyk’s superb play “Say Hi to Abdo”, which holds a million meanings and was directed by Valiantsina Maroz. At “Dramatyzacyja” I was deeply moved by the performative reading of Maryia Bialkovich’s play “Any Place Where Traces Remain”, staged by Bazhena Shamovich. The actors Sviatlana Tsimokhina, Maryia Piatrovich and Aliaksei Saprykin read from sheets of paper, but through the text and their psychophysics they did something incredible with my soul. They made me laugh, grieve, think about that very identity, the fleetingness and finitude of our life, about memory.
Theatre is able to show these contemporary meanings as vividly as hardly any other art form. A good text, like cognac, takes on new meanings over time. That’s what happened at the reading of Kseniya Shtalenkava’s text, directed by Kiryl Masheka — by the end everything inside was simply trembling. It’s that very Aristotelian catharsis, when through that pain a release somehow takes place. It’s as if you enter the body and soul of the artist, you fall into a trance. Neither cinema nor painting — though I love them very much and we often walk through galleries and admire Soutine or Chagall — are able to turn my feelings over and turn me inside out like that.
I could list names for a long time. Aliaksandr Marchanka and his work with students in emigration: for him it’s vital to reflect the present, the complex feelings towards the socio-political situation in Belarus, towards the lot of immigrants. A powerful resonance occurs. Yes, there is conservative theatre in emigration that isn’t close to me. But I adore Belarusian theatre; our actors, directors and composers are scattered around the world, but they are our absolute treasure. The same Mikita Ilyinchyk is reaching the international level; Ihar Shuhaleeu has joined the staff of a European theatre. We went to Shuhaleeu’s performance — it’s incredible! He dances, moves without words, and you tune in, and in those 20 minutes your whole present life flashes past with all its problems. It’s impossible not to marvel at it and not to rejoice.
— And if we talk not about Belarusian theatre? How interested are you in the context of European productions?
— If there’s a chance to get to foreign showings or festivals, I go. But the sphere of my interests has narrowed — it’s Belarusian theatre specifically, I want to write about it. European theatre is useful to me for context, to take the temperature: where Belarusian theatre stands compared with the European one, what its distinctive features are. I don’t take on writing about purely foreign productions — I won’t grasp the full depth of their context, and I don’t want to spread myself thin.
But I don’t skip big names. On a recommendation we watched Twarkowski’s productions (“Lokis” and “Kvantu”), travelled to see Wilson, watched an opera, two Krymov productions at a festival. People fly in from America for this, and we’re here, three hours’ drive away — it would be foolish not to use the opportunity. With local Lithuanian directors there’s a language barrier: theatrical language is universal, but still the depth of perception drops when you don’t understand the language of the original.
Earlier in Minsk we had the International Theatre Art Forum “TEART” — a grand, star-studded programme. For 10 years it opened up new names and forms for us; there was no need to travel anywhere. You buy tickets, go without coming to your senses, and stock up on a year’s worth of context. Now, in emigration, everything happens more from case to case. But when you get to a Lithuanian showcase, you understand: our young men and women are in no way worse, and often even cooler. The scale of financial possibilities here is different, but we have no less talent.
Festival marathons
— What does the festival format give you? What is its importance today?
— Festivals are a great concentration of theatre per square metre of your life. The load is heavy, you have to watch several productions a day, but it has a powerful positive effect, even when a production is bad. A bad production is also a goldmine for analysis. My students know: a separate pleasure is to discuss what we’ve seen together, to compare opinions, to “take the average temperature.”
An important and most exciting part of festivals is the discussions with the creators, the feedback. You never know how they’ll react, especially foreign teams. I always tried to be as honest, well-argued and respectful as possible. When you’re a young woman criticising the work of strangers — it’s a colossal school of public speaking. I always told students who joked about poor productions: “Let there be different productions. Against their backdrop the good ones look even better.”
Now, when many have scattered, festivals and laboratories have become a meeting place. We see who is doing what, we pick up craft from one another. Among such émigré initiatives one can name “Blizki Vskhod”, “Druga Próba”, and now “Dramatyzacyja”. They take place regularly, giving us the chance to observe one another. For me as a researcher this is the ideal format for gathering material. If I stay in the profession, I need to write about how Belarusian theatre develops in emigration, to prove that it hasn’t died, to record the wonderful acting work and performative readings created under the most difficult conditions.
The results of DRAMATYZACYJA
— What seemed most important to you at the 1st DRAMATYZACYJA competition-festival?
— The event itself is important, because there’s no other festival of Belarusian playwriting like it today. We expected a far smaller number of plays, but many were submitted, albeit of varying quality. That means people keep writing, valuing playwriting as the most difficult kind of literature. It’s an unpredictable profession, you won’t make money from it; authors write simply because they cannot not write.
The shortlist included outstanding texts of their time, not one-day wonders — they have a future. And, of course, enormous joy from the work of the directors and actors. Three readings — “The Most Real”, “Limbo” and “Any Place Where Traces Remain” — moved me deeply. People in emigration, despite enormous difficulties, create art, and one cannot help but respect them for it.
— What opportunities does this new playwriting open up?
— In our conditions the main opportunity is to share one’s work, to receive warmth, support and feedback. Ideally one would want these plays and the directors who made wonderful readings to be noticed by producers and to receive interesting offers. But for now we live in the conditional mood. If there are no offers — let’s simply rejoice that this celebration took place under the most difficult, unfavourable conditions. We will certainly remember this first festival forever. Bazhena Shamovich’s reading of Maryia Bialkovich’s play has already taken place at the Raszewski Institute in Warsaw, for a new audience. We’ll see how it develops.