“I am interested in human life with its searching, its hopes, futility, pain, love and weakness. I am interested in living reality with all its indecipherable diversity” – says Olzhas Zhanaidarov. The plays of the young Kazakh playwright Olzhas Zhanaidarov, who became a cult figure at age 35, have been staged in many theatres in Russia and abroad. Of the six plays he has written so far, especially Dzhut (2013) has attracted the attention of Kazakh theatres. This is understandable, since Dzhut deals with the famine of the 1930s in Kazakhstan. The author said he had long wanted to address this tragic period for the Kazakh people, since the subject hardly ever appears in contemporary literature.
The documentary play Dzhut has two parallel storylines. The first one is set in present-day Moscow and centres on the dialogue between Yerbol, the granddaughter of famine victims in Kazakhstan, and Yelena, a journalist in the capital. The second storyline takes us back to the 1930s, when the country was in the grip of famine and Akhmet and Saule's family were suffering a terrible tragedy. The Kazakh part is in Bashkir, the Moscow part is in Russian. The performance received an award at the Chelyabinsk International Festival (2016) and was long-listed for the All-Russia Golden Mask Festival (2016).
Section: SYNERGY World Festival
Actor, director, Merited Artist of the Republic of Bashkortostan, State Prize-winning theatre-maker. Born in 1974 in Ufa, capital of the Republic, Russian Federation, he studied at Ufa Art College and the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts. He worked as a director at the New Drama Theatre in Moscow, then joined the company of Mazhit Gafuri Bashkir Academic Drama Theatre in Ufa, where he was an actor from 1995 to 1998, a full-time director from 2003-2004 and 2012-2019, and a principal director from 2005-2012. He has been the theatre's principal director since 2019. His productions have participated in numerous theatre festivals in Bashkortostan, Russia and abroad and have won many prestigious creative awards.
Located in Ufa, capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan, Russian Federation, it was founded in 1919 and in 1971, it took the name of Mazhit Gafuri, Bashkortostan's national poet. In addition to Bashkir national classics, its repertoire includes works by contemporary Bashkir Tatar authors, as well as well-known and new works from Russian and world literature. It combines foreign theatrical influences with the characteristics of the national language and mentality. It has participated several times in the most prestigious theatre festival, Golden Mask Festival (2008, 2015, 2016, 2018) and has won awards. In 2018, it received the Russian Federation’s Volkov Prize for its contribution to the development of theatre.
