After announcing the repertoire of the first half-year, the State Youth Theatre hit its 59th season with enthusiasm. Lately, the theatre community has been fighting over the proper way to advertise the new season. Meanwhile, the Youth Theatre presents a programme intended for an audience thirsty for good and diverse theatre. When someone tells you not to go to theatre, we give you five reasons why you should come to the Youth Theatre.
1. Opportunity to See Last Play Directed by Eimuntas Nekrošius
In November, the Youth Theatre will present the last performance directed by our theatre genius Eimuntas Nekrošius, The Marriage, based on the play of the same name by Witold Gombrowicz, staged in 2018 at the Warsaw National Theatre (Teatr Narodowy).
W. Gombrowicz’s Marriage is considered a masterpiece of Polish dramaturgy – a poetic treatise about the creation of the world from nothingness. Henryk, the protagonist of the play, confronts both himself and the images that emerge from the darkness surrounding Gombrowicz’s “people’s church” – a destroyed world that needs to be completely rebuilt after the war. It is not clear whether the action in The Marriage really takes place or is just a dream that Henryk dreamt…
The playis Nekrošius’ second large-format work at the Warsaw National Theatre after Dziady by Adam Mickiewicz staged in 2016. The Marriage was highly acclaimed by the Polish audience and theatre critics. The play features some of the brightest stars of Polish theatre and cinema. Tickets will be on sale from September 4.
2. Gintaras Varnas Revives Legendary “Šėpa” Theatre Due to 21st Century Political Realities
The first premiere of the Youth Theatre will be released in December by director Gintaras Varnas. His new performance, Ubu the Tsar, inspired by A. Jarry’s plays about Ubu, texts by Shakespeare and other authors, will be played in the tradition of the political theatre “Šėpa”.
“Once upon a time, in 1989-92, there was “Šėpa” Theatre in Lithuania. A kind of political buffoonery with puppets. Gradually life changed, the national liberation revolution was over and such a theatre seemed to have lost its meaning, this was why we discontinued “Šėpa’s” activity. It was a time to stage Chekhov, Ibsen and Shakespeare. Every now and then someone would urge us to revive the theatre. On several occasions, even Professor Irena Veisaitė tried to persuade me to do it. But I never felt like it. Only now, with this war going on in Ukraine, did I realize that this kind of theatre – a political cabaret – belongs in wartime,” says director G. Varnas.
3. Young Theatre Makers Speak to Young Audience.
The new season of the Youth Theatre will begin with the play Memoirs of a Young Man, which has won the hearts of the audience as well as theatre critics. Based on the novel of the same name by Ričardas Gavelis, it was directed by one of the most talented theatre directors of the younger generation, Eglė Švedkauskaitė, who was awarded the “Golden Cross of the Stage” for this work.
The Youth Theatre continues the young artist residence and experimental theatre platform BLACK BOX. In November, a new audiovisual project The Story of One Sound, inspired by authentic experiences of actors in the theatre and beyond, will be presented by composer Arturas Bumšteinas, who has been in residence at the Youth Theatre for a few years.
Two theatre directors, Justinas Vinciūnas and Jonas Kuprevičius, who graduated from LMTA this year and made a memorable debut on the professional stage, are going to work on new projects as residents of the theatre. At the end of last season, J. Vinciūnas’ graduate work Dust premiered at the Youth Theatre. Later, the play was presented on the stage of the famous Thalia Theatre in Hamburg, and in September it will be performed at the Youth Theatre as well as the Puppet Theatre “Lėlė”, located in the former Vilnius Ghetto territory, as part of the programme dedicated to the 80th anniversary of the liquidation of the ghetto.
4. Meeting of Big Names of Literature and Theatre
One of the most prominent performances about the Holocaust staged in Lithuania, Austerlitz, based on W. G. Sebald’s last novel, considered by many to be his best work, directed by a giant of Polish theatre, Krystian Lupa, will embellish the programme of events held in commemoration of the liquidation of the Vilnius Ghetto. Austerlitz is an epic meditation on the trauma of the Holocaust and its effects on the destiny of an individual and a rare case when the traumatic experience is addressed indirectly through compelling stories of human fates and mesmerizing imagery. Winner of three “Golden Cross of the Stage” awards, Austerlitz has represented our country’s theatre culture at key international theatre festivals.
The second Youth Theatre production by Árpád Schilling, a Hungarian theatre director well-known to the Lithuanian audience, an adaptation of the novel Waiting for the Barbarians by J. M. Coetzee that garnered him the Nobel Prize for Literature, is a penetrating look at contemporary man and the social phenomena of our world, conveyed with the originality and playfulness characteristic of Shilling. According to the director of the play: “Either the barbarians do not exist at all and this whole conflict is just a sad joke full of irony, or we are the barbarians, because we are all human.” The live music performance features almost all troupe of the Youth Theatre. The Barbarians sparked the interest of the audience and theatre professionals – this year the performance will open the Lithuanian theatre showcase of the international theatre festival “Sirenos”.
5. Film Director Ignas Jonynas Returns to Theatre
After 15 years, director Ignas Jonynas, who has established himself in the elite of contemporary Lithuanian cinema, returns to the theatre where he began his creative path three decades ago. His new directorial work is a production based on the play The Son by the famous French playwright and film director Florian Zeller. This is the last part of the trilogy that made Zeller famous (the other two are The Father and The Mother). Like Ibsen, the playwright delves into family problems, relating them to the psychological traumas of modern man. They are often concealed because they do not meet the success standards shaped by society.
According to I. Jonynas, “besides the dynamic external narrative, the leitmotif is very important in the play, because it reveals how our ego destabilizes the world and the lives of those around us. The play talks about people who, in pursuit of their own happiness or goals, despite being quite good and moral, do things that destroy the lives of others. It reveals how by seeking happiness, we tend to bring misery to the lives of our loved ones as well as our own life. How the routine of daily relationships bears fatalism, which inevitably affects our lives. How imperceptibly anxiety, depression, despair, instability creep inside.
There are many more reasons to go to the Youth Theatre in its 59th season. Come and find yours!
State Youth Theatre information