Performance produced in Riga, Latvia, by the play of Pavel Prjazhko.

 

The play was written by the Belarusian playwright Pavel Pryazhko in 2018 and presented as a reading at the festival of new dramaturgy "Lubimovka" that year. 

It was translated onto Latvian and presented as a reading in Riga in 2021 with participation of actor Girts Kruminsh, who has just left the New Riga Theatre after a long period of residence there. As a one of the leading actor at Alvis Hermanis theatre, Kruminsh took part in most of the repertoire there, including the most famous play “Long Life”. Director of the performance is Liena Shmukste, who graduated Latvian Culture Academy (master Mara Kimele) and has worked as an actress and director at New Riga Theatre for more then 10 years.  She has got magistrature education as a theatre director in 2018 and started running her own company concentrated on the experiments in the theatre like theatre of sensations, audio and video works, etc. Liena Shmukste created the online Instagram series based on the audio play “Forest” during the pandemic time with artist Pjotr Kirjusha and this collaboration was long for the creation of the “Neighbour” as well. Part of the performance is video, as a slides-show with sketches of Kirjusha and photos of actors plays in the performance. It is like one ordinary day of each of them, intermittent with unexpected objects and subjects created by the artist in watercolor.

The play “Neighbour” was translated specially for Girts Kruminsh new work as independent artists, when he came back to the stage in 2022. The partner of the experienced and popular Girts Krumins in this performance was the young artist Emils Krumins (not a relative), who after graduation has always worked as an independent actor with various companies and directors in Latvia. One of the most interesting actors of his generation.

The first presentation was in Kuldiga, historical and touristic town on the west of Latvia, where Kruminsh moved to live. The performance was played in Riga during the season 2022-2023 and presented at Plavinas small town in June 2023.

The play is about the meeting of two neighbours by the summer houses village somewhere out of big cities. One day two men meet and talk through the fence between their houses, about weather, potatoes, relatives, other neighbours, life feelings, but really – about nothing. The magic of turning ordinary language into an object of art is one of the important components of this text. Another interest that led to work on the performance is the expectation of an event that does not happen, hanging in the plot. Rhythm, words, distracting movements of the actors, static and ordinariness hide the loneliness of everyone and the feeling of an elusive life.