"Beekeepers",
Gustave Flaubert "Madame Bovary",
"The First Act",
"The Way of a Serpent",
Fjodor Dostojevsky "Idiot"

"Beekeepers", Debut Centre ØThe Ship of FoolsØ, Russia
Here the fallen Icarus comes alive and the ship sails away into the Paradise of dreams
1h 15min.
Directed by and stage designer Nikolay Roschin
Performers Ivans Volkovs, Aleksejs Blohins, Mihails Gorskij, Aleksandrs Minajevs, Andrejs Krilovs, Olesja Jakovļeva, Natalja Pozdnjakova

The creative association “The Ship of Fools” (founded in 1997) unites graduates of Russian Academy of Theatre Art, who have chosen independence instead of state theatres. Critics have evaluated their first work as very promising. The chosen theme of this performance - travels to the world of dreams, it embodies the paintings by Pieter Bruegel the Elder and Hiėronymus Bosch. Images and plots from P.Bruegel’s “Beekeepers and Bird Nesters”, “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus”, “The Battle Between the Money bags and Strong Boxes”, H.Bosch’s “The Ship of Fools”. The characters step out of the frames and start living a life of their won, fantastic life, they, for instance, meet well known Soviet film heroes. The associatively saturated scenes without texts - hungry soldier cooking a rat for dinner, the fallen Icarus, helplessly flapping his wings - together do not form a unified narrative of the performance. The actors simultaneously live in different places in various quantities - looking through a hole in a barrel you can see a desert with fallen Icarus, the actor transforms into a fish, gets hooked on a huge hook in the front of the stage, which is swinging in between the audience. Only the final vision - the sailing ship, unites all the characters in their travels to the happy paradise.

This philosophical successfully unites psychological truth of the acting and the fragmentation, scenic stream of consciousness typical of Western avant-garde.

The production has participated in international theatre festivals in Germany (Potsdam) and St Petersburg. Nikolay Roschin has been awarded the title of the laureate at the competition “Moscow debut’98” as “the best debutant director”.

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Gustave Flaubert “Madame Bovary”, Liepaja Drama Theatre, Latvia
Director Imants Jaunzems
Dramatized by Imants Jaunzems
Stage designer Aldis Kļaviņš
Performers Natālija Grebņeva, Jānis Kuplais, Ēriks Vilsons, Ivonda Vilsone, Aina Karele, Leonīds Locenieks, Ģirts Lukevics, Mārtiņš Lūsis, Gunārs Borgs, Aivars Kalnarājs, Uldis Stelmakers

“Emma is myself”; this comment by the author and his novel “Madame Bovary” brought G. Flaubert instant fame in 1857. The French novelist successfully unites the realistic tradition of sharp social observations with a romantic feature - dissatisfaction with down-to-earth, uncreative existence. G. Flaubert neither moralizes nor idealizes the main heroine of the novel, thus allowing ofr yhe interpretation of Emma Bovary’s mysterions personality. In the stage version by I.Jaunzems Emma becomes “Chekhovs’s Sea-Gull” - a romantic person in an unromantic world, everything is forgiven to the wife of the provincial doctor, entangled in sensuality and illusions.

Imants Jaunzems (1965) graduated from the Latvian Academy of Culture as a theatre director (1992), was awarded MA degree in Theatre science in 1997. Most important productions at Ventspils Amateur Theatre - E. Ionesco’s “The Chairs” (1995), L. Gundars’ “Magic Lairs” (1998), J. Anouilh’s “Euridice” (1999), Jūrmala theatre - studio A.Strindberg’s “The Pelican” (1998). These performances have participated in international amateur theatre festivals in Bulgaria, Estonia, Korea, England, Finland. He has been repeatedly nominated as the best Latvian amateur theatre director of the year. He pays great attention to the issues of the form of the performance, has been influenced by the aesthetics of Robert Wilson, is interested in mask and puppet theatre techniques, very often uses empty space in which the movements of the actors and details saturated with meanings become the main means of expression. “Form is not the coat of ideas, but their flesh.” G.Flaubert.

The director builds the activities on the stage as the deformed inner world of Madame Bovary; the characters perform in Emma’s consciousness. The exquisite painting - like style of the performance harmoniously unites acting, visual image, atmosphere…. “Words lose their traditional meaning, … the primary meaning is embedded in form, and the performance turns into an aesthetic value-in-itself,” critic Ieva Zole. The performance begins on a white square in black draperies, when actors’ bodies, costumes, light and… apricots start talking, during the course of the performance this visual asceticism turns into a staged painting.

"The First Act” The project of Artistic Association "The Fourth Spotlight" at the Independent Theatre "Skatuve", Riga, Latvia
My autobiography and… eternity.
45 min
Text by Jānis Ramba
Music by Orests Silabriedis
Stage design, lighting, directed by Ansis Rūtentāls, Guntis Zēbergs
Performers - Ieva Parša, Kaspars Putniņš, Normunds Ķirsis, Raitis Grigalis
musicans - Orests Silabriedis, Mārtiņš Tauriņš, Edgars Saksons, Reinis Grīnhofs.

Jānis Ramba (1969) - is the author of two collections of poetry (“The Most Pure Thing”, “Morning Coffee”),and translates from English, German and other languages and is also one of the most brilliant writers of his generation.

Orests Silabriedis (1972) is a music journalist and singer. He has composed music for several performances at Latvian National Theatre ( W. Shakespeare “Midsummer Night’s Dream”, O.Preisler “Little Witch”), Liepāja Theatre (B.Ringe “Peik”), New Riga Theatre (B. Brecht “The Righteous Man from Sichuan”), independent theatre “Skatuve” (W. Shakespeare “Cymbeline”, O.Muhina “Tanya, Tanya”, Valmiera Theatre (A.Gala “Oh, Happy Golden Days”, A. Fougard “ An Hour After Midnight”).

Ansis Rūtentāls (1949) is the founder and leader of an independent theatre of movement and is the teacher of movement at the Academy of Culture. He defines his own performances as visual interpretations of music. Has been employed as movement consultant at almost all theatres of Latvia.

Performance was specially created for 1998 Poetry Days* and was performed on stage four times. All the performers are professional singers and have not studied acting. “First Act” is an autobiographical story in verse and music about the authors themselves and their school days. Two boys - Sils (Forest), who has is an idealist they upwards, and Purvs (Swamp) , who is attached to everything earthbound, study at school with Augstā Balss (High Voice), but in time the dogmatic teacher is replaced by a pure and natural girl Pļava (Meadow). Sils and Purvs love Pļava. This love is both impossible and not unrequited. The concept of the performance is not unequivocal, it allows each viewer to reconsider the theme of the play: what does one person mean to another, what is the chosen path in art worth. Performance “…. Also suggests a second theme, the theme of continuation continuation. These relationships…the taste of eternity.” (Ieva Cepurniece)

"The Way of a Serpent", Eesti Drama Theatre
Author Torgny Lindgren
Adapted by Priit Pedajas.
Izrāde divās daļās.
Director Prīts Pedajass
Stage designer Pille Jänes
Performers Mari Lill, Garmen Tabor, Ain Lutsepp, Taavi Teplenkov,Ülle Kaljuste, Priit Pedajas Jan Uuspōld, Veikko Täär, Kleer Maibaum, Tiit Sukk, Külli Koik, Harriet Toompere, Kersti Heinloo, Krista Sildoja, Sofia Joons.

Torgny Lindgren, a Swedish author, was born in 1938. His novel “Snake’s Path in the Cliffs” is known as “the sad ballad” and the critics rank it with the masterpieces of modern Swedish literature. He continues the so- called “neo-provincialism” trend of the 50-ties, featuring the “musicality” of the narrative.“ The Way of a Serpent” the title of the play comes from the books of Proverbs of the Old Testament. This is the story of a 19- th century family ruined by a landslide in Northen Sweden. The land of the family mortgaged for debts is obtained by the local shop - keeper. At first he, and later his son asks, in lien of payment of rent to sleepwith the women of the family.This is a story of birds and deaths, of living on credit and paying the debts. And it is also a story of music: the mother and her children live by playing dance music at village parties.

Director Priit Pedajas (1954) graduated from the Theatre Departmant of the Conservatoire of Tallinn (1976). He has worked in many different theatrical styles, but his works are always connected with the questions of basic human conduct from one side and the queshions of identity from other side. Who we are, what we are, where did we come from? It is a poetical theatre, where sounds and music are very important. He is a musician himself - he has written music for theatre, TV and the cinema. Main works “ The Translations” (1984), “Swamp” (1985), “Departure” (1988), “Meeting” (1991), “Epp Pilarpart’s Pottery” (1991) . “Pottery” is a much travelled play (Poland, Lithuania, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, London, Moscow), and has received very many awards, including Grand Prix in the festival of the Baltic Spring (1992), Kontakt in Torun (1992).

Performance “ Serpent’s way...” talks about the same things that all of his main works do - Pedajas is dveleporing the principles and possibilities of reprtory theatre and creating striking characters and composing ritual songs that create a symbolic narrative of the journey of life. The rites of passage have a special place in the choreography score of the production. The production of Peter Jallaka, “Estonian Games”, from “Homo Novus’97”, which combined folklore with computer graphics in a multimedia form, as well as productions of Prit Pedaia manifest the creative approach of the Estonian artists to the traditional forms of the theater. with the possibilities of ensemble acting and devepoling a capella singing.

Fjodor Dostojevsky "Idiot" Jaunais Rīgas teātris
“In art, I adore realism. Realism, that reaches fantasy.” F.Dostoevsky
4 h
Directed by Viesturs Kairišs
Stage designer Ieva Jurjāne
Performers Kaspars Znotiņš, Ģirts Krūmiņš, Vilis Daudziņš, Guna Zariņa, Māris Liniņš, Regīna Razuma, Sandra Kļaviņa, Baiba Broka, Maija Apine, Andris Keišs, Ģirts Ēcis, Andis Strods, Vilis Daudziņš, Vigo Roga

In 1868, Fiodor Dostoevsky wrote a novel. Instead of choosing a title after its protagonist, Count Mishkin, he named the novel “Idiot”. An encyclopaedia explains the term “idiot” as the ultimate degree of human mental deficiency, marked by a total absence of spiritual life. More than in the psychophysical manifestations of the disease, the greatest artist of passions and the subconscious in the Russian literature is interested in his character’s immediate perception of the world - direct, sensitive, understanding, and, contrary to the previous statement - spiritual. For the first time in the world literature, Dostoevsky has introduced a combination of polarities in a single individual thus thoroughly exploring the apocalypticism and nihilism of the Russian spirit. The enigma of this individual’s soul enthralls, just as the signs of existence of another, invisible world, behind the visible one - dreams, accidental encounters, unexplainable events.

Viesturs Kairish (1971), film and theater director, graduated from the Latvia Academy of Culture in 1997. Internship in the Paris International Artists’ Center (1998). Since 1998, director at the New Riga Theater. Director of 3 short films, productions of 6 plays and one opera. Participated in international theater festivals in Finland, UK, Portugal, Denmark, Latvia. In art, V.Kairišs is primarily fascinated by the individual as an element in the world’s continuous chain of being, in his productions, mystique, secret and the subconscious play an important role. His productions are remarkable by a distinct visual imagery. Space, objects in the room, their interrelation, music and the world of sound, actors’ plasticity and their position in the room serve as elements forming the multidimensionality of the world.

Performance is a conceptual continuation in the studies of human mysteries and the subconscious. Even more than in the previous productions, the visual aspect of the production is charged with meaning (continuing the creative partnership with artist Ieva Jurjāne) - the color scheme, costumes, lights, and even the music. It is a sophisticated, picturesque production where people at times act like postcard characters. V.Kairišs succeeds in creating a world of fantasy, an invisible transition from reality to a surreal vision, when people start to transform, double and appear at the most unexpected locations. The entire production is interwoven by unexplainable details, events ungrounded in the real life trying to reveal an unexpected movement of the human soul. In the beautiful Russian milieu, Kairišs and his cast unravel the themes of love and death - their objective contradiction and real coexistence. Fantastic realism is the frontier that “Idiot” aspires to.