2006-07-17 | Annual Meeting Tallinn June 2006

REVIEWS
Postimees
M – A – G – I – C Five Routes, Five Looks to Our Europe
17.06.2006
We sent four professional theatre critics and one student into library to an superinternational theatre journey to find the secret of the magic net of “Hidden Stories”. Come along.
Rait Avestik – The Magic M
If it is a one-time theatre event, one could even say, a one-time production during which performances of 10-15 minutes by theatres from six countries are played, then it is probably too much to ask for a usual theatre experience and so the audience should also not hope to get a similar experience.
Because the objective of such a massive simultaneous theatre is simply something else. It is meeting (more important for the doers themselves), advertisement (nice and important for the audience) and becoming aware, which is important for all of us (especially for a small and new European country) both in the context of theatre and the general geographic and culture space.
Already the playing site – the National Library with its corners of all kinds – intensified the feeling of being in one and the same pot.
The Slovak theatre Astorka Korzo ´90, the Norwegian theatre Vårt and, with some limitations, the Swiss theatre Theater an der Sihl that promoted their country, theatre and people did it in a selfironic
but funny key by using and showing what is inherent to them in a language and form comprehensible for all. While, for instance, the Turkish theatre Oyunev as well as the German play by Marko Bräutigam were like insistently from their country and in their language.
The interactive fairy tale section with Swiss dwarfs or the piercing national song by the Turkish woman in the cellar of the library just memorizes the names of the theatres. Objective achieved?!
Interesting relations started developing between persons in one group who visited together the different “countries”.
Unofficially, it seems the favourite of this group was the youth theatre Samart from Samara; their play was harder, more figurative and more serious as it is characteristic for Russian theatre. Man
and Woman, tending to kinetics, managed to transmit the nature of Russia in quite a funny manner, by using rice, flour, bread and jam as aids.
It will not sound academically, but probably the most serious and, on the meta level as well, the most exciting part of this international event was the great final where behind the library, in an amphitheatre-like hole the group called Kriminaalne Elevant (translation: Criminal Elephant) played music and the foreign company of theatre makers drank champagne together with the audience.
Maybe the roles of the audience and the actors were changed at this moment and the world became even smaller...
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Madis Kolk – The Temptation A
The definition of intercultural theatre belongs in Estonia into vocabulary of a snob or a freak. The same applies to the term of environmental theatre, although discovering beautiful places for theatre
in the nature has offered a purely aesthetic opportunity for this. But rather as an art experience only, just like we watch the Oscar-film “Crash”.
The experiences developing in such cases impact our reception mechanisms, but are forgotten unfortunately on the street, in analogue situations.
An illusion is formed as if there was a perception cleft between the social and aesthetic experience of art, although the social impact of an art event is not shouting off manifests, like some sophistically
smirk, but the ability to create in the audience an emotional readiness for meeting similar keys in reality.
It cannot be the only aegis of any production, but it can be one layer among many.
It is hard to imagine a better environment for the forming of such an intercultural event. On one hand, the library itself, an environmental reason for the playing site where the traditional stories of different nations are stored but that remain hidden for visitors, they cannot be read, they have to be lived.
Out of office hours. And there are different possibilities for reviving. At least on route A no hollow anti-globalisation rhetoric could be heard, on the background of which the ethnic primordium of European nations could have been highlighted.
It was done more convincingly by using much more playful aids: Slovaks through national selfirony, Norwegians in the same key but by using politics parody, Russians with absurd elements, English and Turkish stressed pure folk culture and Germans looked back to the recent past of politics
thereby doing justice to Brecht.
If one wishes, one could see an ironic self-reflection in this as well, but the Leipzig section will not diminish to one level even when taken sincerely. The whole made it senseless to compare the level,
endeavours and background of single plays.
But the conceptual environment of this mosaic did not begin in the playing room of fairy tales, but in front of the library, at the bronze soldier statue. At the beginning, as pretuning, growing smoothly from one security area to the other, both carrying in different ways the meaning of “being hidden”.
When passing the same way reversely at the end of the play, both secret zones had formed a powerful pair figure, an assessing and dialogic reinterpretation of the term of political correctness.
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Ivar Põllu – The G-Point
The library is full of stories. Magic Net played some of them. Some became a theatre, some a sketch, some a paraphrase, in some candies were dispensed. The most theatre-like were the “Death as Godmother” by Portugal and the “Snowwhite” by Switzerland, funny and complete were also the “Schockheaded Peter” by Germany and the “Canterbury Stories” by United Kingdom.
It was too little time to act as a theatre. One could demonstrate his trick and control for some minutes its functioning. The four abovementioned managed it.
The Portuguese story about a man who had such a lot of children that there were no women in the village suitable for being godmothers, and who therefore has to make a deal with the Death, was
played in he attic.
An ideal place for a play, if only there wasn’t this difficult and long climbing up. The trick was first of all the dark place with no special lighting, and focussing by using torches in the hands of audience – this is interesting and works, is “automatically” lightened. One can only think: why don’t
they do such things Estonia, when the story ends.

The Swiss told their story on a table in the reading room. The trick was interrupting and switching of actors. An actor hardly manages to embody and do something when a “free” actor interrupts with a clap and replaces one or another participant and continues his or her own way or jumps into
the next scene. Cool, why don’t they do such theatre in Estonia, one thinks for a second, and the story is over.
The Germans played their wicked puppet theatre behind the barrier of the wardrobe. Game, smoking puppeteers with pompon caps, silly decadent piano accompaniment from a portable recorder and a cabaret-like low song create a Homeric atmosphere for some minutes. Why don’t they do such theatre in Estonia, one manages to think before it’s over.
The English played in the foyer on stairs and our G-group managed to see and hear three versions of this profligate story: lover’s, wife’s and lovesick monk’s. A good story-telling theatre that works already because it is most like real theatre. And it is especially adequate on the background of stone walls of the strange fortress-library. Fortunately, such thing we have.
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Uku Uusberg – The Forceful I
I describe what happened.
I stood with many other Estonians in the foyer of the National Library, waiting for hidden stories.
At a moment, a really loud key turning sound was played from loud speakers. In order to mark closing of the doors of the National Library and the beginning of all of it. From the stairs of the library languages of foreign nations started to sound. Different languages are really one of the most amazing phenomenons in our life, they sound very sweet to me, funny, like an exorcizing music... they create an experience in any event.
The atmosphere was created.
The music of languages started to be complemented by rhythms created by beating books. Everybody was beating. In a rhythm. Then a lot of paper pieces were flying from very high, in silence, only the vibration of these torn paper pieces was heard. It was beautiful.
And then... there was a small crash, at one end of the foyer the doors were opened and from the far five people with roller suitcases appeared; the people came towards me and other Estonians. They
were also Estonians, actors of VAT Theatre. All in same clothes and with same suitcases. VAT Theatre has suitcases with its logo, its cool.
This evening they were service persons of a travel company, and our tour guides in this adventure.
The moment of their arrival was the strongest experience during this evening, from the atmospheric point of view, in the middle of this Babel of languages and after the mess, in the middle of paper pieces flying in the silence...
Then people were divided into groups and the journey started. My route was as follows: Slovakia was located in the big room the library, Russia in the playing room of VAT Theatre, United Kingdom
was in the main foyer at the border of stairs, Germany at the beginning in the cellar and the second part of Germany in the wardrobe, Poland was located in another cellar corner and Norway in the
mirror room next to VAT Theatre’s room.
Slovaks were searching for “a story to be played”, and played the same “search for a story” again but faster. The Russians played in a mini-minimalistic manner the three legends of St. Petersburg.
The English young man told in an eight-line jambus a rather dirty story. The Germans made a reallife political poster theatre. The other Germans played in a quick manner the story of the matchplaying girl from the “Schockheaded Peter”, accompanied by a lively and oppressing song. The Polish
played a collection of their nation’s rituals and habits.

The Norwegians treated Norway with irony, inspired by Ibsen-Grieg’s “Peer Gynt”. As a general value, there is the power of self-irony that can be perceived in our life. What concerns these productions, the highlighted poor English and a quick, ironic overview of their nation’s folklore by the Slovak group from Bratislava were more charming than... actually, I don’t want to criticize anyone.
What was perceivable in this Magic Net event, was that something that can always be perceived when many strange people meet. Power. Energy. Braveness. I don’t know what these theatres usually do but I liked the completely irresponsive playing manner of many actors, I mean that they were not afraid of anything.
Actually, it was well-founded. In my opinion, it is generally more founded when an actor is less afraid than the mind requires. It is simply simpler to do in abroad.
I am very thankful for this evening. I had the strongest theatre experience, the atmosphere, at the beginning, before starting to move; maybe this atmosphere could have been maintained when moving
from one place to the other, by keeping a constant sound decoration in the foyer, by some tricks in the activity of tour guides or... but it is difficult.
When switching the audience into the game, the atmosphere is affected, in my opinion. But other things develop. The audience somehow starts to care more and to share the feelings more. And feel
itself as a member of the same magic net. It is good when it is like this. It was.
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Andres Keil – Conclusive C – The End Is The Beginning
So – to sum up the guest performers in the newspaper. Everything is true. And in the four routes all the productions were mentioned or described.
Should I add anything? Maybe an admiring look into the future. Meaning that when you have tasted it, you want to eat the whole dish. We saw the meshes of a synergic net, next we would like t see the fishes being caught into the different meshes.
How to do it? By asking a bigger bit from the European Union, from the culture pot of the joint home, of course.
What to do with it? In officialese – intensify connections between fourteen professional theatres from different European regions, assist financially the production of artistic expressions and productions, enable playing of all productions created during the project in all cities participating in the
project.
What does it actually mean? The same, but magnified by 14 times. Total integration. That together and in an integrated manner, 14 full-length productions will be prepared and then played within a year in each city during one week.
What is it good for? See, we know that there are banks in Switzerland and Moslems in Turkey and that Russia is Russia and that football is played and sometimes winter shoes made in Portugal. But we don’t know how people think in these countries. And they don’t know how we think. From the window of a tour bus no thoughts can be seen, no ideas are written on the beach.
But there is only one home. Why should we live in a panel house where neighbours do not want to get acquainted with each other, in modules, with an anonymous hall behind the door. We could live in small houses, on a street, bordered with fences. This is in our power. After all.
Especially, when the culture is quite expensive. However, more it is important than the price paid for it. Intellectual power, discussion, comparing analysis cannot be bought. In lack of them no purchasable
values can be produced. Right? Where is the solution? In will. In (joint) power. In intellectual capacity. And in lobby.
Magic Net “Hidden Stories”
Festival of 14 European theatres On 10th June in the National Library

Postimees
Review: The Magic Net Presented Itself
12.06.2006
Andres Keil
On Saturday evening in the National Library, a joint production of the theatre network Magic Net could be seen, sketches – or whatever - under the common title «Hidden Stories». Embracing
production could be the genre of such an undertaking. Derived from the word “embrace”, in short.
14 theatres, geographically from all over the European joint home, had prepared (mini) productions with an average length of 12 minutes, each of them handling, more or less, myths, their interpretation
as well as creation.
The audience of 200 people was divided into five groups that moved in the gigantic building of the National Library from one production to the other, thereby the routes of the groups were different, so no one from the audience had the possibility to see all the productions.
Playing sites in turn were located in the library from the cellar to the attic, between them foyers, intermediary floors and reading rooms.
And as it is typical for such kind of undertakings, it can be stated, without having a whole picture, that it was an eclectic proposition with a varying artistic level. But this is not the point at the moment.
That there was a fluctuating level.
Something else was important – integration, exchange of experiences and thoughts, formation of joint breathing, and maintaining of individuality. Artistic comparison.
On should have been blind to not see it. Obviously, the audience gathered in the home of books was not. Far from it! – there was an atmosphere during the play that the undersigned had not experienced before in a theatre room (conditionally, of course).
The mood in the foyer of the National Library just a few moments before the beginning was sparkling.
Anticipating. The audience was waiting for an Event, was open and ready.
When a single watcher could not get a whole picture from what happened in the library, then the reader of Postimees is maybe in some respects in a better situation. Namely, in this Saturday’s culture
insert Kultuur Extra all the five routes will be described on a double side.
Theatre critics Madis Kolk, Ivar Põllu, Rait Avestik and the author of this review, as well as Uku Uusberg, Stage Director pathway student of the Drama School of the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre will express their impressions and thoughts.
Hold on then.

Eesti Ekspress
For Differences
Margit Tõnson, Eesti Ekspress, 14.06.2006
Last week, VAT Theatre hosted under the Magic Net network European youth theatres that presented on Saturday evening in the National Library their play, based on the idea of European integration.
Almost all national myths, stories and sagas, played by actors from 12 countries, were solved in a positive self-ironic key. Self-irony is in Estonia a taboo; only Kivirähk (translator’s remark:
a famous Estonian writer) and a few other reckless people have tried to overcome. You
probably remember what happened to the interpreters of Tuljak (translator’s remark: an Estonian national dance)? Watchdogs of culture started growling right away.
It was purifying to see the Norwegians demolishing Ibsen and Grieg, playing with holy looks on recorders “Peer Gynt”’s “Morning Mood”, while the audience was in stitches. No pressure of nation.
To be honest, I would like to declare the serious Estonian culture that does not tolerate any differences and developments next to it, dead and put it into a museum under a glass cover. For future Europeans. So that they could see that once there was this singing nation of one million people
who did not understand any joke nor could stand the ones that were different from it.
A living and developing culture can watch itself from a distance, put the load brought along under question, accept the new, not tending to fundamentalism nor tripping over extreme nationalism.
There is a quotation by Mark Twain in the Magic Net book: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindness”. You take a look in the world, meet different opinions, your tolerance increases.
Of course, this is based on the belief that a person can only develop towards better, and was said at the time when the world was not a global village yet. But the point has remained the same.

Eesti Päevaleht
(12.06.2006)
Happening-Production at The Library Was Weak
Andris Feldmanis
This Saturday hundred actors from all over the Europe gathered under the leadership of VAT Theatre in the National Library, to play a one-time happening-production (official definition) “Hidden stories”.
In the reality it was like this – people were divided into groups of 20-30 people and guided by actors of VAT Theatre through different targets in the national library, where the “hidden stories” of various countries were played.
Here and there, it was a little bit unclear, why is it a “hidden story” or is it a story at all, but the theatre people seemed to enjoy what they were doing. When at the end of the event “Kungla rahvas” was sung diligently by foreigners, then one could only be happy together with them. During
this, even some disturbingly emotional experiences passed out of mind, such as the visit to the target “Leipzig”. Or almost passed, because what concerns the artistic-experience aspect, the audience had to go home with empty hands. Only gadding in the corners of the library was a bit exciting.
In summary – the idea was good but the realisation was boring. So the question whether art can be made under an EU project (it was a cooperation project of theatres, financed by EU) remains in the
air waiting for a better answer. In any case, the brochures were thick and colourful.

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