The play “The Hague” is a grotesque, funny, and sinister “phantasmagoria” based on real events and people related to the Russian war in Ukraine. A kind of version of the (future) trial against Putin and his entourage at The Hague tribunal for war crimes and crimes against humanity plays out before our eyes. Taking place in the mind of a child, a child who will stand as the main accuser. The text interweaves real elements of the political and ideological reality of the Russian Federation together with fragments of documentary war stories and family tragedies. They construct an image of the war through the emotional world of a little girl.
The Ukrainian author Sasha Denisova wrote the play “The Hague” shortly after the onset of the military aggression and has changed it since then periodically according to current developments. Especially for its staging at the National Theatre, director Galin Stoev returned to Bulgaria from France, where since 2018 he has been the artistic director of ThéâtredelaCité in Toulouse.
“The Hague” is a theatrical fantasy – both comic and chilling. It is the first time I have worked on a theatre project that has such a direct and definite connection to our immediate reality. I am exploring the possibility of a harmonious or, on the contrary, paradoxical coexistence between politics and poetry, documentary and musical, myth and current news. This gives rise to emotional and intellectual vertigo and forms a field of reflection that is purely artistic in nature. Galin Stoev
Sasha Denisova is a Ukrainian playwright and director. She graduated from the Faculty of Philology at Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv. She taught directing at the Meyerhold Theatre Centre, lectured at the Moscow Art Theatre School, and ran a studio for auteur and documentary theatre – Studio-OFF. In 2010, after completing her training in Documentary Theatre at the Royal Court Theatre in the UK, Denisova created a company of like-minded artists with whom she practices experimental theatre forms. She fled Russia at the beginning of the war and now lives in Poland, where she has written and produced several documentary plays, including “The Hague”.
Galin Stoev has been working as a theatre director since 1991. He started with the classical repertoire in Sofia and later turned to modern and contemporary texts. After his success in Bulgaria, his work was introduced to various European stages in Belgium, Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia, Bulgaria, Argentina, and Italy. Since 2007 Galin has mainly worked in France and Belgium, more specifically at La Comédie-Française, Le théâtre national de la Colline, Théâtre de Liège, Festival d’Avignon, Odeon theatre del’Europe, etc. Since 2018, he has been Artistic Director of ThéâtredelaCité – Centre Dramatique National Toulouse Occitanie. He has been awarded with and nominated for various national and international theatre awards. In 2019 Galin Stoev was pronounced Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of the French Republic.
Icarus Award 2024 for best performance
Icarus Award 2024 Nomination for Debut (Kremena Deyanova), for best director (Galin Stoev), for best set design (Boris Dalchev) and costumes (Kancho Kasabov)
Askeеr Theatre Award 2024 Nomination for best actress (Radena Valkanova) and for best actress in a supporting role (Iliana Kodjabasheva)
With English surtitles.
The performance is not suitable for people under 14.
