BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
26/12/2008
Actors convey the power of dissent
Rosemary Sorensen
Article from: The Australian
EVERY time someone reads the words Belarus Free Theatre on a news website, a voice is potentially added to the protest against the suppression of free speech in that country.
"We call foreign journalists our bodyguard," Belarus Free Theatre co-founder Natalia Kolyada says. "If something happens to us, if we get arrested or detained, everywhere in the world they will run news stories about it. There will be pressure on Belarussian authorities, and it makes it possible for us to continue.
"Otherwise," she says, "I believe we will sit in jail for a long time."
Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko tries to suppress the activities of the actors, directors and writers associated with the Belarus Free Theatre not because they explicitly attack his dictatorial rule in the little republic declared independent after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. He bans their activities because their creativity -- all creativity -- is considered threatening.
Kolyada, on the phone from the Belarussian capital of Minsk, calls the situation under which this extraordinary theatre company must operate an "aesthetic conflict". The former journalist has a superbly wry turn of phrase. Speaking with her, on a hot December afternoon from the other side of the world, is a chilling, sobering and yet exhilarating experience.
She and her husband, former journalist Nikolai Khalezin, set up the Belarus Free Theatre four years ago to "break through this wall that exists in this country", she says.
"The ruler of our country is a former chairman of a collective farm, so it's easy to imagine what kind of aesthetic he promotes. We are a country without values, because for many years they were destroyed by the Soviet Union and then finished off by him (Lukashenko). The main idea behind our theatre is to show our people the heritage of the world."
Kolyada says the country is in "a terrible information isolation". There is no independent media, all the theatres are state run, all productions and projects have to go through the arts council, and there is a list of people who "are not recommended for publication".
"We want to break this static conflict that exists in our society and show our people what exists in the world."
Belarus Free Theatre is coming to the Sydney Festival and the Brisbane Powerhouse in January with a production that has become the group's signature piece, Being Harold Pinter. A collage of Pinter's writings fused with the words of people jailed for dissidence in Belarus, the work was developed on the suggestion of the playwright Tom Stoppard, who was the first, and most influential, foreign artist to support Belarus Free Theatre's cause.
Almost four years ago, Kolyada and Khalezin sent a letter by email to Stoppard. Within 15 minutes, Kolyada says, they had his response, and the beginning of a commitment to support them. Two years ago Stoppard went to Belarus for a series of underground workshops with theatre people as well as with political activists.
Stoppard was born in Czechoslovakia in 1937, and when he was two his Jewish family fled for their lives. It was Stoppard who suggested to the group it develop a production around the plays and writings of Pinter, who, when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2005, gave a speech excoriating the US and President George W. Bush for the invasion of Iraq. At the end of the speech, some of which has been incorporated into Being Harold Pinter, he spoke of the "crucial obligation" for citizens in every society to "define the real truth of our lives". "If such a determination is not embodied in our political vision," Pinter said, "we have no hope of restoring what is so nearly lost to us: the dignity of man."
"The idea for the play was to show how the violence depicted in Pinter's plays and writings (is relevant) to Belarus," Kolyada points out.
"When we read his work, we understood that he was not writing about Belarus, but you are convinced he knows the situation."
The audience also hears quotations from letters written by dissidents, activists and those who simply will not obey the rules -- like Belarus Free Theatre -- who were arrested in 2006, during a presidential election in which Lukashenko was returned topower.
The performance was developed clandestinely by the group and staged at venues to which the audience was invited at the last moment by text message.
Outside of Belarus, the production is becoming something of a phenomenon as word spreads about the courage of this theatre group and the quality of its performances.
When it was performed in London last year, reviewers said Being Harold Pinter demanded to be seen not just as a courageous act of defiance but because of its powerful staging. As one reviewer put it, "director Vladimir Scherban passes a searchlight of ingenuity" across scenes that harrowingly recreate violent repression.
"All our pieces travel easily. We're very mimimalistic," Kolyada says.
Although she would love the group to be able to stage complex works, with access to new technologies and modern equipment, she says the group's difficult situation has forced it to create a strong actors' theatre.
"We decided it's very important to show how actors can make everything by themselves, without scenery, without technical support, using only their internal forces to really have a connection with the audience," she says. First, however, they must often explain to people where Belarus is.
"Usually we say, 'It's the first stop to Mars'," according to Kolyada. One of main attractions of touring abroad is to see what is happening in theatre internationally, and to convey that information to a new generation of Belarussians. But it's also an opportunity for other nations to learn about Belarus.
"Of course it's really sad that you discover the country through its dictatorial regime, but our aim is that people outside Belarus will know that not only the dictatorship exists but also the Free Theatre, and that there are talented people here and it's possible to work with those people," Kolyada says.
The price for such noble ambitions is high. Belarus Free Theatre became possible after one of Khalezin's plays won an international prize. That helped to set up an international competition for playwrights, to develop a base in Belarus for contemporary and innovative work, and establish a network to keep in touch with colleagues across the world.
Simultaneously, Kolyada and Khalezin were creating for themselves, and for anyone who associated with them, a life of hardship. They are shut out of jobs, denied educational opportunities, and can be arrested (as Kolyada has experienced), tried and convicted for their theatrical activities, which are illegal. The most recent victim of the Government-sanctioned policing of the group is Kolyada's father, who, she says, was systematically harassed for a year and told that his daughter and her group were a disgrace, and that he would lose his job at the Arts Academy if he supported them.
He refused, lost his job, and suffered what she believes is a stress-related heart attack.
"He understands why it happens," Kolyada says of her father's resistance to government bullying. "People in Belarus have started to make jokes about it: if you lose your job, your education, if you get arrested, it's the biggest reward the Belarussian authorities can give you."
The invitation to perform in Sydney came shortly after Belarus Free Theatre had attended a Pinter theatre conference in Leeds, England, in April last year. "It was kind of a surprise, because it is very far away," Kolyada says. "We decided that because last year we performed in New York and Los Angeles, now we need to go to another part of the world."
The group of 11 will spend a month in Australia, during which time they hope to take in as much as they can about the theatre scene here. "That's always the main issue for us," Kolyada says. "We really want to get educated about world theatre."
Being Harold Pinter by the Belarus Free Theatre is at Belvoir St Theatre, Sydney, January 6-11 and January 28-February 1; Q Theatre, Penrith, January 14-17; and the Brisbane Powerhouse, January 21-24.
Source:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24842201-16947,00.html
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