Ukrainians to share their pain in emotional performance
Another Live Theatre premiere
In an empty theatre, with the stage and walls painted as dark as the subject matter, I am watching a short scene being rehearsed… over and over again, so it’s absolutely right.
A young woman – slim, long-haired – is smiling radiantly and waving at someone off-stage, beyond the (imaginary) audience’s vision.
Suddenly, from a laptop near the stage, comes a whoosh, the sound of shattered glass… followed by a silence which gives way to soft, melancholy music.
No longer smiling, the woman stands frozen. In a moment of shared consternation and shock, I get a sense of her life having changed in a blink, shattered as completely as the glass.
It’s powerful drama… but then the illusion is broken.
The prowling director barks instructions, not in English but in Ukrainian, seemingly asking for even more emotion.
Out of character, the woman on stage smiles, tosses her hair and gets ready to go again.
This was my unforgettable glimpse of Silence, a first play by Volodymyr Piterov (also the director) which is to be performed at Live Theatre to mark the fourth anniversary of Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.
There’s to be only one performance but Volodymyr and Ivanna Nitsak, his young compatriot, are not complaining about that.
This is an opportunity they have sought with growing urgency since arriving here from Ukraine in the August following the invasion.
Before the rehearsal, Ivanna told me: “It’s quite an interesting story because for a long time we were trying to find opportunities here for professional actors.
“Volodymyr sent lots of emails to other theatres, not just in Newcastle, but Live Theatre was the only theatre who replied.”
Initially, said Ivanna, they were offering to lead a workshop for teenagers, “because we both are also teachers”.
But having secured a meeting with Paul James and Helen Green, who run Live Theatre’s programme for children and young people, Paul asked the pair if they had any particular story they wanted to tell.
“Already we had this play,” said Ivanna.
So they were invited to work with the youth theatre and were then introduced to Live Theatre’s artistic director, Jack McNamara.
“Paul was so excited about meeting them and the feedback from the youth theatre was very positive,” said Jack.
“I think there were some tears but it was a brilliant session for the young people and super-inspiring.
“This is a space of possibilities, of opportunities, of openness. I’m interested in meeting people who are here for all kinds of reasons and from all kinds of backgrounds.
“We have to be a resource for stories and for different cultures and ideas. But this is not just about giving Ivanna and Volodymyr a space. We can also learn from them because they’ve been doing this for a long time.”
Ivanna, who speaks English quite well (while apologising unnecessarily for her slip-ups), answered for the pair of them, translating my questions for Volodymyr who, with a smile and a shrug, confessed to speaking barely any.
They had come to the UK, she said, as part of a scheme that permitted them to stay temporarily. Volodymyr had an uncle in the North East, which is why they came to Newcastle.
Ivanna, who is 27 (the same age as Maya, her character in the play), said she had decided to become an actress at the age of 14.
“I went to art college and to a youth theatre in my city, Odessa. Sometimes they offer good students a chance to be part of performances and that’s where I met Volodymyr. He had been working as an actor for years.
“After a while he went to Kyiv so I decided to go as well and work there, but days after my audition at the Kyiv theatre, the war started.”
Six months later, the pair decided to get out.
“It was a very hard decision for us to leave Ukraine because we had to let everything go,” said Ivanna.
“Our families, the theatre, all our lives… we just left it all behind.”
That might have been a relief to their families but Ivanna and Volodymyr did not leave their worries behind.
Ivanna’s face clouded as she said: “Every single place in Ukraine is dangerous… you never know what’s going to happen tomorrow. Never. Are you going to wake up tomorrow or not?
“My parents are still in Ukraine and always I want to be knowing what’s going on, checking my phone.
“Right now it’s not easy because the electricity has gone. I remember one whole week when I couldn’t call my sister because there was no electricity, no internet – nothing!
“They are just trying to make people’s lives… (brief pause) horrible.”
All that fear and the anxiety have fed into this play, Volodymyr’s first, although Ivanna said he had been working on an adaptation when the invasion happened.
“Being here, the only thing we could do was observe the situation in Ukraine,” she said.
“We could do nothing more. That’s why we decided, Volodymyr decided, to write a play about Ukrainian women.
“It’s not just one story. We took lots of stories and put them together in one play to share with people and tell them what’s going on.”
Maya, then, embodies all that the women of Ukraine have suffered and continue to suffer.
After briefly consulting with Volodymyr, Ivanna explained: “Mothers have lost their sons, wives have lost their husbands and, yes, definitely, lots of women joined Ukrainian army.
“It’s huge, emotional. I mean, it sounds horrible, all these stories, but we just want to bring some attention to what’s going on in Ukraine and especially what’s going on with Ukrainian women.”
Their big moment under the spotlight – or rather, Ivanna under the spotlight, Volodymyr somewhere in the shadows – will come at Live Theatre on February 21, three days before the anniversary of the invasion.
Despite the sombre nature of the material, they must be excited. It’s their opportunity to be silent no longer.
Ivanna smiled. “He’s very excited,” she said, glancing at a smiling Volodymyr.
“I’m worried. Because obviously I’m on my own on stage, the first time. And in English.
“I think I don’t speak very bad but I’m just worried about… to be clear, to be understandable to people. I’m just doing my best right now.
“I was talking about this with my English teacher and he said, ‘Why are you worried? People understand you are Ukrainian. You don’t have to be worried about this’.”
He’s certainly right and I’m guessing the themes of the play will come across loud and clear. Ivanna, on the evidence of our brief encounter, is a very good actress and Volodymyr, I’d say, knows exactly what he wants.
Tickets for Silence can be bought from the Live Theatre website.