Tuesday, 25.10 - Arrival in Vilnius

18:30 KING UBU performance for adults / based on play by Alfred Jarry
Small hall / 70 min. 

 “King Ubu” by Alfred Jarry called as the beginning of absurd theatre has never been staged before in Vilnius theatre “Lėlė”. It‘s simply unavoidable that in “Lėlė” small stage in an absurd way seeking for power and control born grotesque “King Ubu” characters will come together with nowadays global political events. Although the director points out that the most important thing in this performance is audience acknowledgment of human relationships.

Wednesday, 26.10

11:00 THE GOLD APPLE-TREE, THE WINE WELL performance for children / based on the Lithuanian folk tale
Small hall / 45 min. 

“The Gold Apple-tree, the Wine well“  is one of the most beautiful and most popular Lithuanian fairy tales. In this performance the creators of it had the chance to use several different visual theatre forms that usually are more likely known as if they belonged to cinema art. In the performance you can find loads of folk songs and poems but despite that, the story is based on images. The spectators can meet the oldest forms of visual theatre: panoramas, mirioramas, diaoramas, taumatropas, laterna magica, mirioraminal cards and also – shadow theatre.

12:00 ABOUT THE WORLD performance for children / based on world creation myths
Grand stage / 45 min. 

The performance, which develops the child’s visual, auditory, and tactile senses, explains the world as full of creativity, constant change, and movement, following the cycles of nature, and human beings as a part of nature, which contains the whole Universe. It is inspired by one of the oldest myths about the creation of the world.

Wednesday, 26.10

18:30 THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY performance for adults / based on novel by Oscar Wilde
Attic hall / 60 min. 

The Irish writer Oscar Wilde was known for his charm and flamboyance, both in his works and in private life. His only novel (“The Picture of Dorian Gray”), published in 1890 and written in the form of a fairy tale, caused a scandal when it was published.

The eponymous production by the renowned Lithuanian director Gintarė Radvilavičiūtė highlights the central maxim of the novel through a visually charged puppet show: Life is not enjoyable if we constantly look only at ourselves. The production triggers transformations on the cramped stage and paints portraits of the souls of its characters in the relationship between the actors’ bodies, the mirrors and the static puppets.

Thursday, 27.10 

10:00 EXCURSION TO THE LIVE PUPPET MUSEUM
Cellar / 60 min.  

Guide – Rimas Driežis 

The exhibition of the theatre museum is cozily located in several small rooms near the Small Hall. Here you will find a lot of puppets, masks and scenographic elements from no longer shown performances. The exposition is constantly updated, so the museum is named as “live”. The tour to “The Live Puppet Museum” will be guided by theatre director and puppet master Rimas Driežis.

12:00 PRESENTATION AND DISCUSSION OF THE BOOK CONTEMPORARY PUPPETRY AND CRITICISM
Attic hall / 60 min. 

Contemporary puppetry has been transgressing its own limits for decades by continuously expanding and getting more prolific. On that journey, active viewers and critics represent the necessary interlocutors and final co-authors of the performance – the aforementioned premises constitute the book Contemporary Puppetry and Criticism. In the first part of the book, the authors provide a theoretical and historical approach to that expression in Croatia, Slovenia, Scotland and Lithuania, while the second part focuses on the criticism and the critics. In order to prevent it from dwelling merely on ideas, the book is complemented by examples of reviews created at workshops of the Creative Europe project EU Contemporary Puppetry Critical Platform, the result of which is this book. Thus conceptualized, the book represents a possible basis for further dialogues and interweaving of contemporary puppetry expression and theory, that is, criticism.

Thursday, 27.10

18:30 SESSION BULGAKOV performance for adults (Liutkovno gledališče Ljubljana, Slovenia)
Grand hall / 60 min.

The show is hosted by Vilnius Theatre “Lėlė” as part of “EU Contemporary Puppetry Critic Platform” project 

Session Bulgakov is a reconstruction of the novel, set up on the dynamics of contrasts between burlesque and abstract images of object theatre, which remained on the ruins of the confusion, left behind by Satan and his accomplices. In its fragmentation and through the rhytmization of words, gestures and sounds it combines the associations on today’s obsessed world and the tragic side of everyman with his problems, fears and desires. A trio of actors, animators and musicians puts the spectators into the role of witnesses and eyewitnesses to specific events, leading them through some originally interpreted pictures of the novel at a dynamic pace. 

Friday, 28.10 

10:00 DUCK, DEATH AND TULIP  performance for children / based on Wolf Erlbruch’s book
Small hall / 40 min. 

Death is always somewhere near to us. Just in case. And Death is not who all the misfortunes can be blamed for. It is an ordinary flow of Life granting us some miraculous moments as well – friendship, senseful conversations, games, and an overwhelming warmth accompanying them. It is somewhat odd but while getting familiar with Death we start knowing Life too. And vice versa. That is why to speak about Death and Life is a better solution than to hide or scamper to nowhere. The puppet performance Duck, Death and the Tulip attempts to disclose the importance of such conversations making the children familiar with the end as a natural stage of the circle of Life – a necessity of the counterbalance to Life.

11:30 LECTURE ON CONTEMPORARY PUPPETRY
Attic hall / 60 min. 

W. J. T. Mitchell and the visual turn in contemporary visual theatre: image family domains, perceptual levels and meta-images. Lecture will be led by theatre director, PhD student of the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, coordinator of the creative programmes of the theatre “Lėlė” Žilvinas Vingelis.

Friday, 28.10

18:30 THE SOCKET performance for youth and adults
Attic hall / 60 min. 

Caution! The Socket is a high voltage performance! In this performance, the actors revive minimalist electrical objects (wires, plugs, sockets) on stage in an experimental way, creating characters for the revived beings, engaging the spectator in an unpredictable, comic plot of the play, full of absurd elements.

The literary inspiration for this theatrical hypnosis comes from the fables of Ivan Krylov, which with their simplicity and straightforwardness aptly complement the entirety of the play. The moral lessons ending the fables, in the opinion of the creators, does not explain, but instead, deceptively simplify or even discredit this ambiguous, unsolvable, constantly misleading and changing world of ours. 

 Saturday, 29.10 - Departure from Vilnius