Oskaras Koršunovas is an outstanding figure in Eastern European theatre landscape of the last decade. In this production he looks at the classic Shakespearean tragedy Othello through the prism of contemporary experience. It’s a carnal play about desire, beauty, and fate. It’s also an eminently political play, which challenges our relationship to foreigners, to gender, to the other. Passion, betrayal and revenge come together in sensual and sometimes violent choreography in this large-scale and spectacular performance. But it also shows the extent of manipulation in contemporary societies, where rejection and xenophobia continue to be used as weapons to foster feelings of insecurity and antagonism.

Oskaras Koršunovas graduated in theatre directing from the Lithuanian Academy of Music. While still a student he stood out for his unusual theatrical language. In 1998, the director, together with a few like-minded fellows, founded an independent theatre, called Oskaras Koršunovas Theatre, shortened to just OKT. Koršunovas has built a solid repertoire, which encompasses both contemporary drama and classic stagings. The director’s credo is to stage classics as contemporary plays, recognizing what is relevant to the present time, and contemporary plays – as the classics, conveying what is universal and timeless. In 2008, Koršunovas opened The OKT Studio in his theatre, where he turned the rehearsal process into in-depth laboratory exploration. Oskaras Koršunovas has won a number of national and international awards, among which is the prestigious Europe Theatre Prize for New Realities. In 2009, Oskaras Koršunovas was given the honourable title of the Chevalier of the French order of Literature and Arts. The director was awarded also with the Royal Order of the Polar Star of Sweden and with many other distinctions.

In Lithuanian with Bulgarian and English surtitles.