Oleg Shaposhnikov, the director of Daugavpils Theatre: “You would think that it is almost impossible to lose one’s humane face, as it is the moral duty of a human being to keep their humane core intact and not turn into a beast. However, in recent times, you can observe more often how different individuals, politics and common people alike, can suppress the humanity in their hearts. How to preserve one’s humanity in difficult situation and what happens when it is lost – those are the topics present in many performances of this season. Even if it will not change the society, it is even more important to talk about these issues right now.”
Aleksey Kuralekh
CEASEFIRE
Nonfictional tragedy
Directed by Māris Korsiets
This play is written by Ukrainian playwright from Donetsk and is based on a true story. It is a real tragedy about people caught up in a war, a story about the ability to keep one’s humanity in the face of inhuman conditions. During a short truce, implacable enemies have to join forces and rebuild what they have destroyed by their own hands. People on opposite sides of the barricades, demonized in the eyes of each other, are now forced to cooperate. And when the weapons are lowered it turns out that both sides have much in common – dreams, will to live and longing for peace.
In Russian with subtitles in Latvian.
Premier: 6th of October
Regīna Ezera / Agnese Rutkēviča
By the Still Waters
Stories about waking hours and dreams
Directed by Liene Šmukste
Four women, four stories about love, loneliness and dreams, memories about an event by the still waters of a lake. A few days spent by the lake will be retold from the point of view of each character revealing the turbulent feelings that unseen to others are raging inside of them. The production is structured like a journey through the medium of theatre, a journey through the fates of these four women with each heroine having her own space to share her inner world, dreams and experiences during waking hours.
Premier: 28th of October
William Shakespeare
Macbeth
Directed by Oleg Shaposhnikov
A play about insatiable lust for power that poisons one’s mind and drives deeper into the swamp of heartlessness. The performance will demonstrate the evolution of tyranny from the first thought about taking the throne all the way to madness, sea of blood and disaster brought by desperate refusal to give away one’s power. With the help of techniques of physical theatre, the viewers will look into the mind maddened by power.
The staging will introduce the “new blood” of the theatre – recent graduates from Stanislavs Broks’ Daugavpils Musical Highschool’s programme of Theatre science. The staging was done in cooperation with British actor, director and Shakespearean scholar Paul Goowdwin who assisted the actors in the analysis of original material and with the skills of theatre language.
Premiere: 22th of November
Performance in English and Russian with Latvian subtitles. With the support of British Council Latvia.
Peter Quilter
Snowbound
Comedy
Directed by Ivars Lūsis
Staging of the play Snowbound by the British playwright Peter Quilter. A romantic comedy about two lonely hearts in which warm feelings are born, while a blizzard is raging outside.
Premier: December, 2023
They Shoot Horses, Don't They
A performance of movements and sounds
Choreography and libretto by Irina Bogeruka
Based on motives of Horace McCoy’s novel They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, this staging will demonstrate a synthesis of dance, stage movement, vocal performance and acting. America during the Great Depression. Unemployment and poverty. People are ready to do anything for money. Including taking part in hours-long dance marathon in front of avid eyes of curious spectators. The competition turns into a bloody battle for the place under the sun in which people are ready to sacrifice their health and even their lives to take the prize. A story about human weakness that shows itself during hardship, a tale about lies, fear, betrayal and vanity.