REVIEW: Russian-Ukrainian immediacy in new production "Hell Dialogues"
“This high-speed adaptation masterfully reflects the anxiety and turbulence of the here and now.”
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(Photo credit: Kate Baranovskaya)
"Hell is other people." The famous phrase from Jean-Paul Sartre's 1944 existentialist play “No Exit” rings eerie and newly omniscient when experienced alongside a 2023 newscycle. Initially reflective of Sartre’s ideas about the perpetual ontological struggle of seeing oneself as an object from the view of another’s consciousness, the modern implications of Sartre’s play when experienced alongside notions of Otherness in the face of ongoing global wars are strikingly and newly heartbreaking for those willing to hold a theatrical mirror to reality.
This brave exploration is a new hybrid play produced by and starring a team with roots in Ukraine and Russia now playing at The Sheen Center in Manhattan. The play, titled “Hell Dialogues,” is self-described as being born as a result of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 when a group of artists found themselves at a crossroads during their production of “No Exit;” instead of abandoning their project, they chose to channel their concerns into their art, delving deeper into the exploration of human nature amidst turmoil by incorporating fragments of Plato's Dialogues and hence renaming the play as a hybrid adaptation. Daniel Veksler, a Russian-English translator and journalist who immigrated from the Soviet Union as a child in 1989, adapted the script being produced by Kyiv natives Anna Zinenko and Lucy Palamarchuk of the organization Locus29, a group that focuses on film and theatrical projects previously including a NYC screening of the 1930 Ukrainian silent film Zemlya.
The play never exploits the theme of war or modern implications directly– But for a sophisticated global New York audience inundated with calls for domestic and international empathy and media literacy amidst the constant swarm of newscycles, it’s abundantly clear the premise of the play aligns with the liminality of tragedy and displacement, being plucked from one’s home into a situation of uncertainty, in this case to Hell. As the play’s program notes point out, Sartre’s original was written during World War II, “a cataclysm that shook people’s sense of security and identity.” Veksler’s high-speed adaptation, aided by director Masha Kotlova’s innovative technique in impermanence and immediacy, masterfully reflects the anxiety and turbulence of the here and now.
Opening with an all-cast, straight-on facing of the audience, the play immediately places us in a shared space with the performers, bracing to engage and face them and ourselves for the next 90 minutes: Opening their mouths in “ah’s,” the cast subverts this simple syllable into what could be read as screams of hell, into an almost melodic or meditative quality in its layered build. Thus, we begin.
The play centers on three characters who find themselves waiting in a mysterious, cluttered room they come to understand as the afterlife, locked inside together for eternity as each other’s only company (and torture). As they grapple with their own demons and confront the choices that shaped their lives, the shapes of the stage taunt of maddening simplicity. Designed by Anna Kiraly, there is an assortment of mismatched, colorful chairs littered about, like a Pre-K (or IKEA as one character pointed out) gone awry, with only a 1975-esque door looming center as the only threshold for change, escape, or transformation. Costumes designed by displaced Ukrainian Sasha Mazhara are deceptively commonplace, subtly addled by an askew jacket or misplaced shoe as the characters’ wits slowly unravel. Dynamic lighting by Megan Mahoney and music by The Tiger Lillies punctuate and crescendo throughout the piece, creating a sensory experience that envelops one into the present.
The production uses a unique psycho-physical acting technique by director Masha Kotlova, who is a student of the world-renowned Russian director Anatolii Vasiliev. Kotlova’s kinetic vocabulary fills the space with constant movement, the actors as atoms ping-ponging their fears and anxieties as physically as verbally. Feeding off each other’s energy, the ensemble’s work is also aided by Kotlova’s encouragement of vocal and line improvisations woven into scenes seamlessly without detraction or glaring flamboyance; the inclusion of an audience member’s striped sweater for example brings levity and immediacy to creating a shared, safe space amongst spectator and spectacle.
Kotlova’s work thus grounds the actors in space and time alongside the audience, encouraging a world where asides break the fourth wall in playful propinquity. Veksler’s adaptation is peppered with Plato’s Dialogues, expanding on the themes of Sartre’s work with newly imbued debates between Sartre’s Valet character (Leo Grinberg) and his Uncle, here embodying Socrates as well (Peter Murphy). These characters function not only to carry forward particular lines of thought after “pausing” the action of the play, but also to address the audience directly to join imaginatively in the discussion by contributing definitions or reactions of our own. The Dialogue portions vacillate between heady philosophy and slapstick humor. Grinberg and Murphy are slippery and slick, talking on each other’s heels to keep the pace and energy up. Their philosophical drives require an intimidating leap to keep up with them intellectually and interact spontaneously; while spurring the audience to philosophical activity may have been the primary purpose of Plato’s original dialogues, this production is dizzyingly ambitious in its fusion of contemplative and reactive scenes, stimulating and challenging an audience out of traditional passivity to keep up with them every step, twitch, and convulsion of the way.
The tight knit ensemble tasked with Sartre’s original plot are Kylee Jacoby (a delicate crackerjack Estelle), Max Katz (a cutthroat Joseph Garcin), and Siobhan Brandman, understudy for Anna Zinenko in the performance I attended, for a fiery Inez. Through permutations of interactions over the course of their time together, the trio dances, contorts, and seesaws their way through the text with a ferocious, infectious focus. Their astute, individualized physical performances via Kotlova’s technique snap and thrash at each other as if their bodies were in a dialogue of their own. These characterizations exemplify the theme that individual impact and decision clash together to make a torturous whole.
Locus29’s “Hell Dialogues” is a masterfully playful production that trades grandeur ontological posturing for granular, nuanced kinetic embodiment, exploding Satre and Plato’s themes into the here and now for an urgent, necessary new storytelling.
Production credits
“Hell Dialogues”
Directed by Masha Kotlova
Written/adapted by Dan Veksler
Presented by Locus29
The cast features Leo Grinberg, Kylee Jacoby, Max Katz, Peter Murphy, Anna Zinenko, and Siobhan Brandman.
“Hell Dialogues” features music by Marc Ribot, The Tiger Lillies, Beliy Ostrog; set design by Anna Kiraly; light design by Megan Mahoney; costume design by Sasha Mazhara; and audio engineering by Eric Phoenix Goodman.
“Hell Dialogues” runs at The Sheen Center for Thought & Culture (18 Bleecker Street, New York, NY 10012) November 2-12. The running time is 90 minutes with no intermission. For more information, please visit Eventbrite.