Hedda Gabler - H.Ibsen |
Hamlet - Shakespeare |
Antigone - Sophocles |
First Love - S.Beckett |
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In Your Hands, London, Spring 2005
Written by Natalia Pelevine
In Your Hands is based on the real events in a Moscow theatre in 2002 when almost
one thousand people were taken hostage by Chechen rebels. The tormenting 57 hours
ended in tragedy when the Russian government gassed all those in the building before
storming it.
The process of writing this piece involved a tremendous amount of research from
as many viewpoints and media texts as possible. As a result, although the characters
are fictional, many elements of In Your Hands are based on real facts.
Natalia Pelevine’s aspiration was to make the audience sympathize for and relate
to the characters as well as undergo the experience of being taken hostage. Thus,
the play opens as though being a musical before the theatre is suddenly taken over
by ‘hostage takers’, who remain in the auditorium, interacting with audience members
throughout the whole performance.
At the centre of In Your Hands are the two women (hostage and hostage taker), worlds
apart and yet extremely connected.
Synopsis
The audience start watching an upbeat musical, when suddenly it is broken up by
armed, camouflaged men rushing into the auditorium and declaring that the building
has been taken over. The terrorists demand that the troops are pulled out of Chechnya,
and if this demand is not met, the government will have 1000 corpses on their hands.
Unexpectedly, several “audience members” from the front row are escorted and seated
on stage, whilst bombs and ammunition take their places. While some of the hostage
takers remain present and active in the audience throughout the play, the audience
members-actors on stage-are all trying to deal with the situation in their own way.
Eventually, some of them are released and others are moved elsewhere, with two women
remaining-the journalist Natasha and terrorist Seda. Their relationship, tense,
difficult and dangerous takes an unforeseen turn, when Seda, previously wearing
a veil, reveals herself as the sister of Natasha’s first love. In disbelief that
fate has made them meet after so many years, in these agonising circumstances, the
two women are stripped of their roles as victim and villain, and are simply that-women.
As the two women share the most terrifying day of their lives, the government, refusing
to negotiate, decide to cunningly fill the terror-absorbed auditorium with sleeping
gas in order to storm the building. The sleeping gas puts many in the audience into
a sleep from which they will never awake. The two women do not even get a chance
to say goodbye.
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Pink Roses
Set in a Los Angeles strip club, its red low-lit interior becomes a cage for the
searching, falling, surviving and failing souls.
Nica
When love overwhelms death acquires a friendly face.
Anne Frank; The face behind the legend
A one-woman show in which Anne’s life, love, suffering and hopes domineer every
inch of air.
Three lives. One love.
“If I was to live a hundred lives, I would love you in each one of them and in each
one of them I would lose you”.
Lenkom comes to London
UK Tour of one of Russia’s most successful theatres with their most recent award
winning show.
Education through Theatre
Performances and workshops in schools in the UK and other European countries. A
group of young, vigorous actors performing extracts from classical and contemporary
literature as well as conducting improvisational workshops and games for younger
children. Also offered is a fully developed and highly effective programme aimed
at ESL students.
WWW.
Bumping into her in the virtual world changed his reality.
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Anne Frank Monoplay
Natalia Pelevine’s Adaptation of The Diary of Anne Frank was staged and filmed for
Southbank International School in London, and has since been successfully used as
an educational resource in the study of IB History.
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