There will never be too much of love? 1
In brief: The performance directed by Agnius Jankevičius “Don’t Wonder if Somebody Comes and Sets Your House on Fire” premiered at the State Youth Theatre in November of 2013. A strange feeling persisted after the performance – if it was social theatre, it lacked actuality. Still, after watching the newest premieres of the director in Kaunas, no thoughts about socially engaged theatre arise. If we can speak about the propagation of any idea, we will have to speak about love or its absence as the reason of all things.
The fourth premiere of VMU theatre “Dance Delhi” was presented in March. The performance created according to the play of Ivan Vyrypayev tells the consistent story of five people. This story about the dance Delhi, love, feeling and reconciliation with the world is told in the coherent manner. The performance encourages to love and accept the world with open heart in the way it is, with all pain. Still, it seems that nobody remains happy in the performance. Perhaps love and feeling was too little or perhaps everybody was concerned with their personal love, happiness and creation?
Everybody was left unhappy (and dead) in the second premiere of A.Jankevičiaus “Tribe”, which was shown at the National Kaunas Drama Theatre in the middle of April, too. The performance staged according to the novel of I.Simonaitytė “The Fate of the Šimoniai of Aukštujai” tells the story of one family with Rožė in the centre of action. This performance is closer to the dramatic and theatrical side of A.Jankevičius. However, the integrity of the performance was ruined by doubtful mise-en-sc`enes as well as actors’ work.
While watching both aforementioned performances, “Dance Helhi” and “Tribe”, the director A. Jankevičius started appearing as a contemporary Buddha who speaks about love and reconciliation with the world from the stage. It seems that the director has turned to the road of search for love with his performance “Let’s Save Love” already and speaks about it in more and more sentimental ways. Still, if you are fighting for love like a knight, if it is the main aim and reason, you should choose suitable weapons for the fight and not wave them haphazardly. The comrades-in-arms should also help instead of stopping the director.
