For Immediate Release, Please
November 13, 2020
Media Contact: Mark W. Soucy
mark@arlekinplayers.com 978-289-9887
ARLEKIN PLAYERS THEATRE (BOSTON) & ROGUE MACHINE THEATRE (LA) JOIN FORCES WITH HOWLROUND, CHERRY ORCHARD FESTIVAL, and BROADBAND COLLABORATIVE
PRESENT
INSULTED. BELARUS(SIA) EVENT SERIES
November 17-19, 2020 on Howlround
Nov 17 RUSSIAN PERFORMANCE (with English Subtitles) 8:00pm EDT/5:00pm PST
Nov 18 ENGLISH PERFORMANCE 8:00pm EDT/5:00pm PST
Nov 19 ARTIST TALK AT 11:00am EDT/8:00am PST
Boston, MA & Los Angeles, CA – Arlekin Players Theatre (Boston), Rogue Machine Theatre (LA) BroadBand Collaborative, and Cherry Orchard Festival (NY), have joined forces with Howlround Theatre Commons to present a week-long series of events around the new play Insulted. Belarus(sia) by Andrei Kuriechik, translated by John Freedman, to be streamed internationally November 17-19, 2020. On Tuesday, November 17, Arlekin Players Theater will present a streamed reading in Russian (with English subtitles) at 8:00pm EDT, directed by Igor Golyak. On Wednesday, November 18, RogueMachine Theatre will present a streamed reading in English at 8:00pm EDT, directed by Guillermo Cienfuegos. The series of events will culminate in a streamed artists conversation on Thursday, November 19 at 11:00am EDT, with directors Golyak and Cienfuegos, playwright Kureichik, and translator Freedman, moderated by Dr. Barbara Wallace Grossman.
Kureichik completed Insulted. Belarus(sia) on September 9. He sent it to translator John Freedman at 3:13 p.m. Central European Time. “He asked if I would translate it and organize a few readings in order to spread the word about the events in Belarus. Within ten minutes, I had lined up six theatres, including New York Theatre Workshop, even without a script they could read,” says Freedman. “Six days later I finished the translation and got it out to dozens more theatres.” As of early November, 66 companies in 22 countries are participating in the Insulted. Belarus(sia) Worldwide Reading Project, with Kureichik participating in many post-show discussions from an undisclosed location. He is now in temporary exile in Bulgaria, and will join the artists talk on November 19 via Zoom.
The play tells the story of the first month of the Belarusian revolution, in August 2020, on the eve of the inevitable democratization of the country after 26 years of dictatorship. The backstory of the piece is quite extraordinary. It is the rare case of a genuine work of dramatic art being created in real time about a topic that is self-destructing and transforming furiously even as each word is being tapped out on a computer keyboard.
When Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko (“the last dictator in Europe”) chose on August 9, 2020, to falsify an election he had lost in a landslide, he thought he was just bending a nation to suit his own needs as he had done for 26 years. In fact, he set off a revolution, as the Belarusian people poured onto the streets to support Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the woman they actually had elected. He also angered, and inspired, Kureichik, Belarus’s top playwright and screenwriter, famed for his good-natured comedies. While posting a prodigious amount of exhortative information about the protests online, Kureichik began putting together a play that is based, in part, on statements made by Lukashenko and Tikhanovskaya, who are represented in the play as OLDSTER and NOVICE. Their statements are interwoven with five imagined characters who speak the language and thoughts that were coming to Kureichik fast and heavy.
These five other characters present an overview of Belarusian society. MENTOR isan aging teacher who believes in “law and order” and helps guarantee Lukashenko’s re-elections every four years by falsifying results. CORPSE is a young soccer fan with too much energy to burn who is sick of living under the same president his entire life. AVIAN is a storm trooper who trained during the Maidan revolution in Ukraine and is now in Belarus to put down rebellions there. CHEERFUL is a high-spirited, loving young woman who believes in asking the Universe to send her good vibes, and whose sister is to marry the storm trooper. Finally, there is YOUTH, Lukashenko’s teenaged son Kolya, who is being groomed for the presidency, but would prefer to play internet games.
The lives of every one of these people – with the possible exception of Kolya, for his debt to destiny is yet to be paid – will be impacted tragically by Lukashenko’s decision to crush the revolution with violence and torture. And yet, the resulting play – hard-hitting as it is – is filled with humor, hope and dignity.
“This is such an important work at this time, and we are so honored to be part of the world-wide theater movement embracing it,” says Golyak. “Through a truly global partnership with Andrei, John, Dr. Grossman, and our colleagues at Rogue Machine, Cherry Orchard Festival, BroadBand Collaborative, and Howlround, Arlekin is honored to now share these readings and discussions with the broader audience the piece deserves, and shine a light on the daily struggle for democracy in solidarity with the people of Belarus.”
“The process of creating theatre is such that it usually takes a long time for a play to be able to respond to current events,” says Cienfuegos. “It’s not often that one gets to work on a project with this kind of urgency – as it’s all still happening. ‘Insulted. Belarus(sia)’ is an extraordinary achievement by Andrei and John, and under the most impossible of circumstances.
We at Rogue Machine are truly honored to team up with Arlekin Players and HowlRound to help tell this story of injustice and courage and hope.”
INSULTED. BELARUS(SIA) EVENT SERIES – AT A GLANCE
Tuesday 17 November
A performance of Insulted. Belarus(sia) by Andrei Kureichik
Arlekin Players Theater, Boston
5 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 7 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 8 p.m. EST (Boston, UTC -5)
(Russian, with English subtitles)
Directed by Igor Golyak
CAST
Novice: Rimma Gluzman
Avian: Gena Ravvin
Cheerful: Polina Dubovikova
Mentor: Darya Denisova
Corpse: Misha Tyutunik
Young Buck: Boris Berdnikov
Oldster: Alex Petetsky
Produced by
Igor Golyak, Arlekin Players Theater
Sara Stackhouse, BroadBand Collective
Co-presented by Cherry Orchard Festival
Wednesday 18 November
A performance of Insulted. Belarus(sia) by Andrei Kureichik with Rogue Machine, L.A.
5 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 7 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 8 p.m. EST (Boston, UTC -5)
(English)
Directed by Guillermo Cienfuegos
CAST
Novice: Ashlee Atkinson
Avian: Joshua Bitton
Cheerful: Rachel Brunner
Mentor: Caroline Clay
Corpse: Alex Neher
Young Buck: Aric Floyd
Oldster: Joe Spano
Directed by Guillermo Cienfuegos
Executive Producer: John P. Flynn
Produced by Joshua Bitton and Rachel Brunner
Stage Manager/Sound designer/Zoom master: Michelle Hanzelova
Rogue Machine Artistic Director: John P. Flynn
Co-Artistic Directors: Guillermo Cienfuegos & Elina de Santos
Thursday 19 November
Special Artists Talk:
Insulted Belarus(sia): The Play. The Documentary. The Movement.
8 a.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 10 a.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 11 a.m. EST (Boston, UTC -5)
Playwright Andrei Kureichik (from temporary exile in Bulgaria)
Translator John Freedman (from Moscow)
RogueMachine co-artistic director Guillermo Cienfuegos (L.A.)
Arlekin artistic director Igor Goylak (Boston)
Moderated by Dr. Barbara Wallace Grossman
Bios
Andrei Kureichik (playwright) is one of the top playwrights, screenwriters and producers in Belarus. Author of some 30 plays, he has 17 credits on IMDB as a screenwriter, 4 as a producer, 3 as a director. His plays have been performed at the prestigious Moscow Art Theatre and Janka Kupala Theaters in Moscow and Minsk, as well as at numerous theatres throughout the former Soviet Union. Andrei wrote a much-read article about the events in Belarus two weeks ago for American Theater magazine. He is a member of the Coordinating Council of Belarus, whose members are called upon to lead the transition to a new government in Belarus. Many of the members are now in prison. He will be joining us virtually for these readings.
John Freedman (translator) has written or edited and translated eleven books in the sphere of Russian drama and theater, including Silence’s Roar: The Life and Drama of Nikolai Erdman and Provoking Theater: Kama Ginkas Directs (co-authored with Ginkas), and his play Dancing, Not Dead won The Internationalists’ Global Playwright Contest in 2011. His Real and Phantom Pains: An Anthology of New Russian Drama is the largest collection of Russian plays ever published. He currently holds the position of Advisor to the Artistic Director at the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre in Moscow. He was the theater critic of The Moscow Times from the paper’s inception in 1992 until October 2015. He has been: a columnist for Plays International since 1994; the editor of the Russian Theater Archive for Harwood Academic Publishers (1992-2002); and has frequently contributed to the New York Times and other periodicals.
Guillermo Cienfuegos (director, RogueMachine reading, co-artistic director) was recently featured in the “Role Call: People to Watch” issue of American Theater Magazine. He currently serves as co-artistic director at Rogue Machine, where he directed the World Premieres of Neil McGowan’s Disposable Necessities, David Jacobi’s Ready Steady Yeti Go and the Los Angeles premiere of Greg Keller’s Dutch Masters (Stage Raw Award winner for Best Two Person Performance). Cienfuegos won both the Ovation and Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards for Best Director for his production of Shakespeare’s Henry V at Pacific Resident Theatre. Other credits at PRT include Ionesco’s Rhinoceros, Pinter’s The Homecoming and the world premieres of Safe at Home: An Evening with Orson Bean (LADCC Award for Best Solo Show),The Fried Meat Trilogy, Lions and Julia (which transferred to New York’s 59E59 Theatre, Off-Broadway). He also directed the Los Angeles premiere of Stephen Adly Guirgis’ Between Riverside and Crazy at the Fountain Theatre as well as productions at the Blank Theatre Company, Chalk Repertory Theatre and Nom de Guerre. Cienfuegos is a graduate of the American Conservatory Theatre and is a faculty member at the USC School of Dramatic Arts.
Igor Golyak (director, Arlekin reading, artistic director) received the 2020 Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Director for Arlekin’s The Stone and was also nominated in the same year for his direction of Arlekin’s The Seagull. He is an Associate Professor at the Boston Conservatory, and has spent over a decade teaching the art of theatre. He is the founder of the Igor Golyak Acting Studio and Artistic Director of Arlekin Players Theatre which has won numerous awards in the United States and internationally and most recently an Elliot Norton award for his production of Dead Man’s Diary at Arts Emerson. Arlekin Players Theatre is a multicultural, multi-national collaborative that is growing year to year in the number of audience members, company actors, and volunteers. His theatre has been invited to perform on famous stages and at world-renowned festivals all over the world, including Moscow Art Theatre, and festivals in Yerevan, Armenia, New York City, Chicago, Lviv, Ukraine, Monaco, and many others.
Dr. Barbara Wallace Grossman (moderator) is a theatre historian, voice specialist, director, and author with strong interests as a researcher and practitioner in contemporary musical theatre, Holocaust and Genocide-related theatre and film, arts advocacy, and mindfulness as a way to alleviate anxiety, develop resilience, and promote positive change. Professor of Theatre at Tufts University, her publications include Funny Woman: The Life and Times of Fanny Brice (Indiana University Press) and A Spectacle of Suffering: Clara Morris on the American Stage (Southern Illinois University Press). A presidential appointee to the National Council on the Arts (1994-1999) and the United States Holocaust Memorial Council (2000-2005), she served as Vice Chair of the Massachusetts Cultural Council from 2007 to 2019. In addition to her long affiliation with the American Repertory Theater as a member of its Board of Advisors, she serves on the Anti-Defamation League’s New England Regional Board and on the Board of Directors for MassCreative, the most effective advocacy organization for the creative community in Massachusetts.
About HowlRound TV
HowlRound TV is a global, commons-based peer produced, open access livestreaming and video archive project stewarded by the nonprofit HowlRound. HowlRound TV is a free and shared resource for live conversations and performances relevant to the world’s performing arts and cultural fields. Its mission is to break geographic isolation, promote resource sharing, and to develop our knowledge commons collectively. Participate in a community of peer organizations revolutionizing the flow of information, knowledge, and access in our field by becoming a producer and co-producing with us. Learn more by going to our participate page. For any other queries, email tv@howlround.com, or call Vijay Mathew at +1 917.686.3185 Signal/WhatsApp. View the video archive of past events.