{"id":9,"date":"2016-02-22T17:52:22","date_gmt":"2016-02-22T17:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/?p=9"},"modified":"2022-05-29T09:13:05","modified_gmt":"2022-05-29T09:13:05","slug":"the-struggle-for-a-free-theatre-or-long-live-belarus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/the-struggle-for-a-free-theatre-or-long-live-belarus\/","title":{"rendered":"The Struggle for a Free Theatre | Or \u201cLong Live Belarus\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Randy Gener<\/strong>[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n

\"1085344345\"<\/p>\n

R\u00e9sum\u00e9
\n<\/strong>La lutte pour un th\u00e9\u00e2tre libre | Ou \u00ab Vive le B\u00e9larus libre ! \u00bb<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00ab Il nous faut trouver un moyen de retourner au B\u00e9larus pour soutenir nos enfants l\u00e0-bas. Il faut aussi tenir compte des choix personnels des acteurs. Le principal, c\u2019est que nous ayons re\u00e7u ce soutien exceptionnel de la part de la communaut\u00e9 th\u00e9\u00e2trale de New York, ce qui nous a maintenus en vie sur le plan artistique et nous a aid\u00e9s en tant que personnes. En ce qui concerne nos activit\u00e9s et notre campagne en faveur du B\u00e9larus, si nous savons que nous avons du travail \u2014 que nous pouvons faire du th\u00e9\u00e2tre et donc que cette part de notre vie demeure active \u2014, bien s\u00fbr que cela nous inspire et nous encourage \u00e0 continuer pour le B\u00e9larus, pour les gens qui sont en prison aujourd\u2019hui et pour ceux qui attendent leur proc\u00e8s \u00e0 Minsk. \u00bb Citation de Natalya Kolyada, fondatrice du Belarus Free Theatre.<\/p>\n

\u0432\u0435\u0440\u0448 \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>a poem for freedom)<\/em>
\n\u0436\u044b\u0446\u044c\u0446\u0435\u0308 \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>a life for freedom)<\/em>
\n\u043b\u0435\u0308\u0441 \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>a fate for freedom)<\/em><\/p>\n

\u044f \u0440\u044b\u0445\u0442\u0443\u044e\u0441\u044f \u043c\u0430\u0446\u0443\u044e \u0443\u0306 \u0441\u0430\u0431\u0435 (<\/em>I prepare I make strong in myself)<\/em>
\n\u0443\u043f\u044d\u0443\u0306\u043d\u0435\u043d\u0430\u0441\u044c\u0446\u044c (<\/em>certainty)<\/em>
\n\u0441\u0435\u0308\u043d\u044c\u043d\u044f \u044f \u0431\u0443\u0434\u0443 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u043d\u0430\u0438\u0306 (<\/em>today I shall be free)<\/em>
\n\u044f \u0430\u0434\u043f\u0430\u0447\u043d\u0443 \u0430\u0434 \u0441\u0430\u043c\u043e\u0442\u043d\u044b\u0445 \u0434\u0443\u043c\u0430\u043a (I shall rest from solitary thoughts )<\/em><\/p>\n

\u0441\u043b\u043e\u0432\u044b \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>words for freedom)<\/em>
\n\u0434\u0443\u043c\u043a\u0456 \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>thoughts for freedom)<\/em>
\n\u043c\u0430\u0440\u044b \u043d\u0430 \u0441\u0432\u0430\u0431\u043e\u0434\u0443 (<\/em>visions for freedom)<\/em><\/p>\n

\u044f \u0432\u044b\u0440\u0432\u0443\u0441\u044f \u0456 \u0431\u0443\u0434\u0437\u0435 \u0443\u0306\u0441\u0435\u0308 \u043d\u0430\u0434\u0437\u0432\u044b\u0447\u0430\u0438\u0306\u043d\u0430 (<\/em>I break out and all will be extraordinary)<\/em>
\n\u044f \u0431\u0443\u0434\u0443 \u043c\u043e\u0446\u043d\u0430\u0438\u0306 \u0456 \u043f\u0430\u0441\u044c\u043b\u044f\u0434\u043e\u0443\u0306\u043d\u0430\u0438\u0306 (<\/em>I shall be strong and constant)<\/em>
\n\u2014 from a poem of liberty by Iryna Vo\u0142ach (\u0406\u0440\u044b\u043d\u0430 \u0412\u043e\u043b\u0430\u0445)<\/p>\n

1 The Struggle for a Free Theatre<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cA renaissance of new writing happens every four years in Minsk,\u201d Vladimir Shcherban says, dryly. A sardonic grin flashes on his fair-skinned, wrinkly-eyed face. \u201cWhen elections for president take place, Belarusians are gripped by a strong desire to write. <\/strong>They write about the time they spent in jail, the violence in the streets and the human-rights violations of K.G.B. secret police. Otherwise Minsk is a very calm and undisturbed city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking in Russian through Tioma Zhaliaznia, a Belarus Free Theatre cohort who was asked to act as interpreter, Shcherban is sitting onstage beside Natalya Kolyada, a founder of the Minsk-based troupe. The occasion is a post-performance public discussion, which I moderated this past January in New York City. Several weeks ago, 10 members of the Free Theatre snuck out of Minsk to meet a La MaMa E.T.C. engagement as part of the Public Theater\u2019s annual Under the Radar Festival.<\/p>\n

A gifted theatre director whose characteristically emblematic and Eastern European\u2013style productions are banned from the Belarus state-theatre repertory, Shcherban adapted and directed Being Harold Pinter<\/em>, which first premiered in London in February 2008 \u2014 a couple of years after Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko was re-elected to a third term. It has only now arrived in New York City \u2014 less than a month after Lukashenko was re-elected to a fourth presidential term.<\/p>\n

The resurgence of new writing that Shcherban caustically alludes to, in our public conversation, are the letters from political prisoners in Belarus \u2014 real accounts of policy brutality, state-approved violence and political disappearances which he stitched into the latter section of Being Harold Pinter<\/em>. The Belarus Free Theatre\u2019s signature work, Being Harold Pinter<\/em> theatrically collates six of Harold Pinter\u2019s plays and uses his Nobel Prize speech as a spine.<\/p>\n

\"Oleg
Oleg Sidorchik in the Belarus Free Theatre’s Being Harold Pinter adapted and directed by Vladimir Shcherban from the plays and texts of Harold Pinter, 2011 \u00a9 Joan Marcus, La MaMa E.T.C. and the Public Theater (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These firsthand stories \u2014 of ordinary citizens who were arbitrarily arrested and jailed for exercising their right to speak at a public assembly, as well as of writers, students artists and political activists who experienced assorted K.G.B. police mistreatments (Belarus state police is still called by that Soviet name) \u2014 are the most potent moments of Shcherban\u2019s play. They transform Pinter\u2019s political one-act plays into a Belarusian cri de coeur<\/em> in which the horrific nightmares of Pinter\u2019s fiction are finally demonstrated to have become abject reality in present-day Minsk.<\/p>\n

Similar literary outpourings, Shcherban remarks, also greeted the December 2010 presidential elections in Belarus. \u201cBelarus is completely isolated from the rest of the world,\u201d Shcherban continues. \u201cPromoting our productions and inserting them into the European context are both necessary and indispensable. Our tours abroad are a means of overcoming the censorship that we are victims of at home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shcherban tells me that he would have wanted to update Being Harold Pinter<\/em> with newer letters and fresher accounts of the violent demonstrations that took place between December 19 and 20. Those were the fateful days when tens of thousands of people converged on Independence Square in the Minsk capital. Chanting \u201cOut!\u201d, \u201cLong Live Belarus!\u201d and other anti-Lukashenko slogans, these protesters were angered over what appeared to be fraud in the elections. According to the state electoral commission, Lukashenko had won 79.7 percent with 100 percent of voces counted in the former Soviety republic. It put voter turnout in sub-zero temperatures at more than 90 percent.<\/p>\n

Up to 10,000 people demonstrated in the streets of the country\u2019s snow-bound capital, Minsk. Opposition sources say hundreds of protestors were apprehended by the police and security services. According to one estimate, more than 700 people were arrested that night, crammed into police vans and thrown into dank and often crowded prison cells. That number included member of the Belarus Free Theatre. Lukashenko, under fire from international election monitors for flawed vote countring and police heavy-handedness, accused demonstrators of banditry. \u201cThere will be no revolution or criminality in Belarus,\u201d he said, adding that security forces had stood firm against \u201cbarbarism and destruction\u201d by militants.<\/p>\n

Later, after the public conversation, as Shcherban and I were hanging out at the lobby of La MaMa E.T.C., Shcherban tells me that unfortunately there just was not any time to spare. Before Shcherban could have the chance to re-jigger his powerful production of Being Harold Pinter<\/em>, the Free Theatre members were either in jail or in hiding, the targets of a crackdown by Belarus\u2019s government. From around Christmas to the New Year, the great fear was that the company would not be able to make it to New York. At one point, it had appeared that the future of the company itself might be in jeopardy. Shcherban adds that as soon as he can grab some free time, he will most definitely update Being Harold Pinter<\/em> to reflect the political situation.<\/p>\n

Owing to the post-election crackdowns led by the K.G.B., Free Theatre members had to be smuggled out of Belarus. They left in small groups and changed vehicles regularly to elude government forces and keep them off the trails. Adds Mark Russell, producer of the Under the Radar Festival, \u201cWe spent a lot of time trying to re-jigger the airplane tickets. The Free Theatre actors did most of the inventive stuff themselves. We finally got them here just in time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Denis
Denis Tarasenka, Yana Rusakevich, Pavel Gorodnitski, Oleg Sidorchik and Irana Yaroshevich in the Belarus Free Theatre’s Being Harold Pinter adapted and directed by Vladimir Shcherban from the plays and texts of Harold Pinter, 2011 \u00a9 Joan Marcus, La MaMa E.T.C. and the Public Theater (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now that the Belarus writers, actors and crew are safely in New York (they are bunking in the apartment of an American patron), the troupe\u2019s greatest dilemma is that they are unable to return to their native country without repercussions from the government. Grave questions hang in the air. Is the Free Theatre seeking political asylum in the United States? If not, where will it go? How will its members live? Where will they be able to find permanent shelter so that they can continue to create brand-new productions, as opposed to merely touring Being Harold Pinter<\/em> and other established hits?<\/p>\n

Correlatively, if the Free Theatre does manage to find permanent refuge abroad, if it becomes cut off from its native country, how can this troupe maintain the Belarusian integrity of its dual artistic mission \u2014 to perform politically engaged productions that bring international attention to the authoritarian regime of Lukashenko as well as to foment a sort of denim revolution through theatre? If the Free Theatre were to remain abroad for an indefinite period of time, could a company in exile truly remain a free theatre from Belarus?<\/p>\n

These are difficult questions. And they are compounded by a grueling performance schedule internationally as well as the necessity to continue to stoke the anti-Lukashenko flames through various political actions and publicity efforts.<\/p>\n

Until the Under the Radar Festival premiere of Being Harold Pinter<\/em> following the 2010 presidential elections, the Free Theatre has largely been an obscure entity in American terms. Since 2005, when it was founded, this theatre company has successfully used the Internet to bypass the official blacklist of the Belarusian Ministry of Culture. For the most part, the Free Theatre has garnered allies in Europe, specifically the United Kingdom, Poland, Czech Republic and Sweden. An impressive roster of celebrity artists \u2014 Tom Stoppard, Vaclav Havel, Mick Jagger and Ian McKellen \u2014 has championed the company. Pinter, before his death, allowed the company to perform his plays anywhere without paying him royalties.<\/p>\n

The Free Theatre has also picked up support from a number of American individuals, arts organizations, colleges and universities \u2014 in particular, the New York\u2013based theatre artist Aaron Landsman, producer Catherine Coray of the hotINK international festival of play readings, Theatre Without Borders, Georgetown University, the exchange, playwright Erik Ehn\u2019s annual Arts in One World conferences \u2014 all of which hosted readings, seminars, performances, presentations, networking and residencies in various cities across the country. And yet, although the Free Theatre has visited the United States many times in the past, it has not enjoyed a critical mass of artistic praise and concentrated media hoopla in American shores. Until now.<\/p>\n

2 Thinking About the Long Standing Problem of Democracy in Belarus<\/strong><\/p>\n

On December 20, 2010, the KGB arrested Natalya Kolyada in Minsk. She was made to lie, face down, in a prison van and was verbally abused by the guards.<\/p>\n

She remembers: \u201cThe guard said, \u2018My only dream is to kill you. If you so much as move, you\u2019ll feel my baton all over your body, you animal.\u2019 Then he threatened to rape me.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked for life\u2019s basic necessities such as a drink of water, the guards replied, Kolyada says: \u201cDrink from the toilet.\u201d She adds, \u201cThreats and insults rained incessantly on us. That evening one of the guards told us: \u2018Nazis will look like a fairy tale for you.\u2019 Knowing that every third Belarusian was killed during World War II by the Nazis, it was not possible to even absorb such an expression. It was unbearably difficult to stand the insults, beatings and humiliation for the young people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kolyada was lucky though. Spending one night in jail, she was released the next day due to a bureaucratic misidentification. (A judge called out someone else\u2019s name.) Before she was detained, Kolyada did manage to compile a list of Belarusian prisoners, which she sent her brother, who then passed it on to me via Facebook:<\/p>\n

Ashurok Witold
\nBachilo Vladimir
\nBourbeau Andrew
\nVusik Dmitry
\nGavva Denis
\nGapanov Ivan
\nDavydenko Anton
\nDaineko Dmitry
\nIvan Ivanov
\nAndrew Kozlowski
\nKoptyug Dmitry
\nArtem Kuzmin
\nKuntsevich Anton
\nKurza Dmitry
\nKurlovich Eugene
\nKurnevich Victor
\nLevdansky Artem
\nLelevich Yang
\nLugin Maxim
\nMartynov, Viktor
\nMasuk Sergey
\nMelnikov Piero
\nNikolaichik Vladislav
\nSergei Novitski
\nNosov Olga
\nPavlovian Maria
\nPekarchik Sergey
\nPotupchik Nikita
\nVlad Savitsky
\nSavchuk Artem
\nFurman Valentine
\nFurman, Victor
\nKhmelnitsky, Valentin
\nHudosh Roman
\nChakina Leonid
\nShidlovsky Denis
\nShlopak Alexander
\nAlexander Yakushev<\/p>\n

Meanwhile KGB broke into the apartment Kolyada shares with the playwright Nikolai Khalezin \u2014 her husband and a founder of the Free Theatre. \u201cWhen Nikolai and I were separated at Independence Square, he managed to escape,\u201d she says. \u201cNikolai picked up our youngest daughter, who was with friends, and got home. Early in the morning KGB officers tried to infiltrate into our house, but my husband, parents and daughter stayed silent and gave no sign that anyone was there. KGB officers returned several times during the morning, but my husband managed to escape from the house.\u201d<\/p>\n

Artiom Zhelezniak, a Free Theatre manager originally from Ukraine, was not so lucky. KGB raided the offices of Charter97.org, a news site that was launched in 1998. Zhelezniak and the site editor Natalya Radzina were both working in the room when, in a pre-dawn raid (while Zhelezniak was translating accounts of the election crackdowns into English), they were both jailed and sentenced to 11 to 15 days in prison for participation in what the government termed as \u201cmass riots.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNatalia was beaten so badly in the Square she got a concussion,\u201d Kolyada says in a speech she gave at a U.S. Senate committee hearing on foreign relations. \u201cThat night, the entire editorial staff, including Artiom, was arrested. As he confessed to me, he had never experienced anything like that during his entire life. For almost three days he was either in a paddy wagon, or in \u2018a glass\u2019 \u2014 a tiny concrete cell about 80 centimeters square; less than one square meter. And, above all, he was stuffed in with two other detainees in that tiny cell. He was allowed to use a bathroom once within first three days of his arrest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Charter97\u2019s computers were confiscated, their offices closed down. The site\u2019s editors and volunteers had no choice but to flee to nearby Vilnius in Lithuania where they re-located and set up a new shop.<\/p>\n

On a cold and rainy Wednesday, in the morning of January 19, 2011 \u2014 exactly a month after Lukashenko\u2019s crackdown on freedom of expression \u2014 Kolyada and Khalezin, along with Shcherban and the others, found themselves in the midst of different protest action. This time, they were demonstrating in the streets of New York City, and not Minsk.<\/p>\n

On that Wednesday, the Public Theater and Amnesty International USA gathered about 300 to 400 New Yorkers in a street corner in front of the permanent Belarus Mission to the United States in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Public Theater artistic director Oskar Eustis, associate producer Maria Goyanes, playwright Tony Kushner and Kolyada spoke to a crowd that chanted \u201cLong Live Belarus\u201d and carried signs with images of political prisoners currently in Belarus. Since the New York Police Department refused to grant an amplified sound permit, the protestors shouted at the top of their lungs as opposed to using bullhorns or microphones.<\/p>\n

Several New York protestors wore gags on their mouths to symbolize the oppression of free speech and expression in that country. In sum, more than 30 theatre companies, both large and small, were represented at the protest. These included the Manhattan Theatre Club, Culture Project, HERE Arts Center, La MaMa E.T.C., Movement Theatre Company and Amerinda. News of the demonstration was disseminated by various U.S. media outlets (including WNYC and the New York Times<\/em>) and by Belarusian opposition websites and journals published by local Belarusian\u2013American associations.<\/p>\n

Without question, the Free Theatre\u2019s New York performances had gone beyond being merely a routine festival engagement \u2014 a major news event that never stopped from unfolding before our very eyes.<\/p>\n

On January 6, for instance \u2014 two days after KGB burst into Kolyada\u2019s and Khalezin\u2019s apartment in Minsk (the police was looking for the couple and the whereabouts of their two daughters, and inquiring how they were able to leave the country unnoticed) \u2014 Koliada joined other representatives of Belarusian civil society at the U.S. State Department in Washington, D.C., for a private meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Soon after, Clinton condemned the Belarusian government\u2019s crackdown on political opponents, stressing her concern for detainees and for their family members. Clinton also told the activists that \u201cwe are watching the government\u2019s actions closely and considering our response to those actions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Marina
Marina Yurevich and Oleg Sidorchik in the Public Theater’s presentation of Belarus Free Theatre’s Discover Love written and directed by Nikolai Khalezin, La MaMa E.T.C., April 2011
\u00a9 Joan Marcus (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On January 17, a host of U.S. celebrities, including Tony Kushner, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Kevin Kline, Olympia Dukakis, Laurie Anderson, Mandy Patinkin and Lily Rabe, lent their names and talents for a Public Theater benefit in New York. Some even took part in the reading, spoke lines that were drawn from the words of Belarusian political prisoners, and agreed to be filmed for a \u201cLong Live Belarus\u201d video campaign, intended for the Internet.<\/p>\n

On the evening of January 19, the PEN American Center organized a benefit at Le Poisson Rouge in downtown New York, hosted by Tom Stoppard. The British playwright of Arcadia<\/em> and The Coast of Utopia<\/em>asked Hollywood and Broadway actors Margaret Colin and Billy Crudup read Stoppard\u2019s contribution to an omnibus play The Laws of War<\/em>, which he had originally co-written with other British playwrights for a 2010 celebration of the work of Human Rights Watch. The novelists E.L. Doctorow and Don DeLillo gave readings at the PEN American Center benefit from City of God<\/em> and Mao II<\/em>, respectively.<\/p>\n

\u201cWorld leaders need to answer to artists,\u201d Kolyada said at the benefit at Le Poisson Rouge\u2019s downstairs space. \u201cPoliticians do not have steps; they have just words.\u201d<\/p>\n

In fact, the day-long events of January 19 took an unexpectedly poignant turn when in the midst of the morning protests Yana Rusakevich, a dark-haired Free Theatre actor, received a text message from Minsk which informed her that her husband had been arrested. Rusakveich was disconsolate throughout most of that morning\u2019s protest. During the PEN American Center\u2019s evening benefit, which culminated with a stirring performance of \u201cNumbers\u201d (one of the three parts of Zone of Silence<\/em>, another signature Free Theatre production), Rusakevich broke down in tears while performing onstage.<\/p>\n

\"Jude
Jude Law and Sienna Miller in a rehearsal of the Belarus Free Theatre’s Discover Love written by Nikolai Khalezin, December 2010 \u00a9 Keith Pattison, Young Vic Theater (U.K.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On February 1 \u2014 the same day that the New York Times<\/em>reported that the U.S. and Europe have imposed unprecedented sanctions on Lukashenko who has been prohibited from entering the U.S. and the European Union, and that any of his assets held in those territories have been frozen \u2014 the Free Theatre transferred Being Harold Pinter<\/em>from New York to Chicago, where it performed in a limited engagement through Feb. 27.<\/p>\n

Many facets of the Chicago cultural community worked together to step into the breach and arranged to bring Being Harold Pinter<\/em> to Chicago. The move was conceived by a group of Chicago arts and educational institutions, led by the Goodman Theatre, including the League of Chicago Theatres and Northwestern University. \u201cThis is a real-life situation of artists fighting for their freedom of expression, Roche Schulfer, the executive director of the Goodman, reportedly said, noting that the board of the Goodman Theatre pledged the financial guarantees on Martin Luther King Day to make the transfer happen.<\/p>\n

The Chicago engagement was also a delaying tactic. As the January gig in New York wound down and the company\u2019s future prospects looked even more grim and uncertain, the month-long Chicago stay allowed the Belarus artists to consider their options, including requesting political asylum in the United States.<\/p>\n

\"Sienna
Sienna Miller and Jude Law in a rehearsal of the Belarus Free Theatre’s Discover Love written by Nikolai Khalezin, December 2010 \u00a9 Keith Pattison, Young Vic Theater (U.K.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cYanna\u2019s husband was later released by the KGB, and he flew to Chicago to visit Yanna,\u201d Kolyada says. \u201cHis plane ticket was covered by one of our patrons. Later, after we went to perform in Hong Kong on March 8, some of our actors returned to Minsk. Obviously they went back illegally. They did not go through the official Belarusian borders. The KGB police visited Yanna\u2019s apartment. She was interrogated the next day. Last week we learned that her husband could be drafted forcefully to the army. In Belarus, army service is compulsory; there is no chance to avoid it. We do hope that he can leave Belarus and go study in Poland. We will do whatever is possible on our side. In addition to being Yanna\u2019s husband, he is a student in our underground acting studio. We wish for him to develop artistically so that he can perform in our company.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Kolyada and Khalezin, unlike some of the other Free Theatre actors, the couple has not yet returned to Minsk. Fortunately their oldest daughter, Danielle, has been traveling with them abroad. Their youngest daughter, however, still remains in Belarus. \u201cShe was wanted by KGB in an apartment of remote relatives,\u201d Kolyada says. \u201cSo it\u2019s an ongoing process in terms of hunting us down. Our parents are under psychological pressure from the police and KGB who come to our apartments once a week within the last three weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n

The KGB gave their Minsk neighbors instructions on how to contact the secret police in case Kolyada and Khalezin are spotted returning to their homes. \u201cWe talk to our family and our friends everyday,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s a nightmare there. The day before yesterday a friend said, \u2018The whole country is like a concentration camp now.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

In early April, a bomb exploded at the busiest station of the Minsk subway, killing 200 innocent people. The explosion, labeled a terrorist act even though Belarus is waging no wars and has no unsettled territorial disputes, is considered the most tragic bombing Belarus has seen since the end of World War II. \u201cWhen you understand,\u201d Kolyada remarks, in a voice that verges on conjecture, \u201cthat Belarus authorities are ready to organize an underground explosion and to kill its own people in order to withdraw attention from the country\u2019s economic problems, the situation is becoming very scary.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whatever personal troubles both Kolyada and Khalezin may be experiencing right now while in exile, Kolyada says, \u201cit\u2019s not possible to compare the pain of our parents whose children are free but not physically with them, to the pain of those other Belarusians whose relatives are right now sitting in KGB jail. Our situation is complicated because we are homeless, but in their situation it’s very horrible. Everything that happens in Belarus now reminds us of only Stalinist times.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Marina
Marina Yurevich, Pavel Gorodnitski and Oleg Sidorchik in the Public Theater’s presentation of Belarus Free Theatre’s Discover Love written and directed by Nikolai Khalezin, La MaMa E.T.C., April 2011 \u00a9 Joan Marcus (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

3 \u201cLong Live Belarus\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The American efforts to support the Belarus Free Theatre eventually came full circle in the United Kingdom, where the political sympathy has remained consistent and steadfast and longstanding and unwavering. On March 28, the London theatres Almeida, Old Vic and New Vic; the British human rights organization Index on Censorshop; and the Free Theatre conducted a joint action and demonstration that were different in purpose from the New York and Chicago actions.<\/p>\n

In London, members of the British parliament were regaled with an actual Free Theatre performance within its chambers. In the Second Chamber of the British Parliament, Khalezin and the Hollywood actor Jude Law alternated speaking the lines of the solo play Generation Jeans<\/em>, Khalezin\u2019s semi-autobiographical account of the opposition party\u2019s attempts during the 2006 presidential elections to foment a Jeans Revolution in Minsk.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur numerous British friends learned of the New York and Chicago events,\u201d says Khalezin, \u201cand suggested organizing a similar action in London.\u201d The aim of the London political action was not directed at the Lukashenko government, as it was in New York. This time, the Free Theatre\u2019s goal was to press Grayling Company \u2014 the world\u2019s third largest independent public relations, public affairs and investor relations consultancy in Central and Eastern Europe, South Eastern Europe and Eurasia \u2014 to halt its operations in Belarus.<\/p>\n

The political action in London was put together quickly. \u201cWe were absolutely running out of time,\u201d Khalezin remembers. \u201cIn 10 days we are supposed to start another New York tour.\u201d After the Chicago performances, the Free Theatre returned to La MaMa E.T.C. in New York City to perform in repertory, from April 18 to May 15, its productions of Being Harold Pinter<\/em>, Discover Love<\/em> and Zone of Silence<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"Belarus
Belarus Free Theatre actors (Denis Tarasenka, Marina Yurevich, Yana Rusakevich, Oleg Sidorchik, Pavel Gorodnitski) together with Adjoah Andoh, Jude Law, Sienna Miller and Sam West at the Young Vic Theater, December 2010 \u00a9 Keith Pattison (U.K.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Says Khalezin: \u201cOur goals [in London] were to attract attention to British businesses which are actively cooperating with the Lukashenko regime and to initiate hearings in the British Parliament. That\u2019s why the venue we spotted for the pickets was the street in front of Grayling Offices and for the performance The Houses of Parliament.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the next step for the Free Theatre had begun to slowly sort itself out. Kevin Spacey, the American actor who artistically leads the Old Vic Theatre in London, had seen a performance of Being Harold Pinter<\/em> at La MaMa E.T.C. He has now offered the Free Theatre rehearsal space so it can work on a future production. Other famous names who took part in the London protests include Almeida Theatre\u2019s artistic director Michael Attenborough, actors Sam West and Adjoah Andoh, and playwrights Alexandra Wood and Laura Wade. Attenborough, too, extended a helping hand to the Free Theatre. In the month of July 2011, Attenborough invited the company to perform at the Almeida Theatre in London. In August 2011, the company will be in residence in Edinburgh where Shcherban will work with the Free Theatre actors on a new production, entitled Minsk 2011<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe key to their involvement in Belarusian issues,\u201d adds Khalezin, \u201cis probably that both the country and its problems have been personified for them. Belarus for them is not just an encyclopedia article but the Free Theatre troupe \u2014 real people. Today British journalists are already calling Tom Stoppard, Kevin Spacey and Jude Law \u2018the voices of democratic Belarus.\u2019 \u201c<\/p>\n

On May 16, the Belarus Free Theatre won a special Ross Wetzsteon Memorial Obie Award, which came with a $1,000 cash grant. (The company was also nominated for a Drama Desk Award in the category of Unique Theatrical Experience.) Soon after the Free Theatre left the United States. The next sojourn in their exile: London.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur dream is to start to work again,\u201d Kolyada says. \u201cWe want to create new performances and to continue to present the performances that we have now. It\u2019s absolutely vital and important for us that we exist artistically in order to survive. We are now re-building our artistic life. Performing is an essential part of our lives \u2014 to make performances, to perform them and to have a communication with the audience. Otherwise the company doesn\u2019t exist.\u201d<\/p>\n

Director Vladimir Shcherban has been having an intimate relationship with Skype. Through Skype, he has been conducting workshops and communicating with the Belarus actors and students who have remained in Minsk. Says Kolyada: \u201cThey know that working with us is dangerous, and yet they continue. We are just so proud of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Belarus actors Pavel Gorodnitski, Denis Tarasenko and Oleg Sidorchik lead parallel lives as musicians, and they have issued a new album of music that was recently presented in Minsk.<\/p>\n

\"Oleg
Oleg Sidorchik, Yana Rusakevich, Pavel Gorodnitski and Marina Yurevich, in the Public Theater’s presentation of Belarus Free Theatre’s Zone of Silence directed by Vladimir Shcherban ; and conceived by Shcherban, Natalya Kolyada and Nikolai Khalezin, La MaMa E.T.C., April 2011 \u00a9 Joan Marcus, La MaMa E.T.C., New York City (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Yana
Yana Rusakevich, Pavel Gorodnitski, Oleg Sidorchik, Marina Yurevich and Denis Tarasenka in the Public Theater’s presentation of Belarus Free Theatre’s Zone of Silence directed by Vladimir Shcherban ; and conceived by Shcherban, Natalya Kolyada and Nikolai Khalezin, La MaMa E.T.C., April 2011 \u00a9 Joan Marcus, La MaMa E.T.C., New York City (USA)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Before leaving for London, Kolyada tells me that it is too complicated to seek political asylum in the U.S. \u201cYou are talking about people\u2019s lives,\u201d she says. \u201cWe need to find a way to go back to Belarus and support our children back home. The actors\u2019 personal choices need to be considered. The main thing for us is that we have received this unique support in terms of the New York theatre community keeping us alive artistically and helping us as people. In terms of our activities and our campaign for Belarus, when we know we\u2019ve got work \u2014 when we know we are able to produce theatre, when this part of our life is active \u2014 of course we have more inspiration and more encouragement to continue for Belarus \u2014 and for the people in jail today and for the people who stand in trials in Minsk.\u201d<\/p>\n

Besides, the Belarus Free Theatre is a theatre project whose existence hinges on the hope that this former Soviet country will shift politically from dictatorship to democracy. So long as Lukashenko remains in power, the Free Theatre will remain.<\/p>\n

Kolyada reserves a special message for critics. \u201cWe really do not want audiences and theatre specialists to observe our complicated lives and be regarded as victims. The only thing that matters for us is when we are accepted based on our performances and our artistic value. If our work is seen as having aesthetic worth, our theatre work would be valuable no matter what conditions we live in and where we come from.\u201d<\/p>\n

America has finally woken up to the plight of Europe\u2019s last dictatorship. With a sardonic laugh, Shcherban remarks. \u201cOur conditions in Belarus are getting worse, so creatively we can expect things to get better.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\"1085344345\"<\/p>\n

<\/a>[1] Randy Gener<\/strong> is a writer, editor, critic, playwright and visual artist in New York City. He recently debuted a photographic installation-art exhibition, \u201cIn the Garden of One World,\u201d at New York\u2019s La MaMa La Galleria and is the author of \u201cLove Seats for Virginia Woolf\u201d and other Off-Broadway plays. He is the 2009 winner of the George Jean Nathan Award, the highest accolade for dramatic criticism in the United States for his essays in American Theatre magazine, published by Theatre Communications Group. He won a 2010 Deadline Club Award given by the Society of Professional Journalists for \u201cFomenting a Denim Revolution\u201d (www.tcg.org\/publications\/at\/mayjune09\/belarus.cf<\/a>), the first major critical essay published in the U.S. on the Belarus Free Theatre based on his travels in Minsk.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9<\/strong> 2011 Randy Gener
\nCritical Stages\/Sc\u00e8nes critiques<\/em> e-ISSN: 2409-7411<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

This work is licensed under the
\nCreative Commons Attribution International License CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Randy Gener[1] R\u00e9sum\u00e9 La lutte pour un th\u00e9\u00e2tre libre | Ou \u00ab Vive le B\u00e9larus libre ! \u00bb \u00ab Il nous faut trouver un moyen de retourner au B\u00e9larus pour soutenir nos enfants l\u00e0-bas. Il faut aussi tenir compte<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-special-topics","","tg-column-two"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/02\/1085344345.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7j4tu-9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":730,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions\/730"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.critical-stages.org\/4\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}