Maidan: Voices From The Uprising

Verbatim Testimony from Maidan Square

Edited by Natal’ya Vorozhbit and Andrei Mai

Translated by Sasha Dugdale

Directed by Vicky Featherstone

Following the week of readings from South Africa, a new verbatim play Maidan: Voices from the Uprising, directed by Artistic Director Vicky Featherstone, opens in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs for three performances.

Playwright Natal’ya Vorozhbit and director Andrei Mai spent three months on the Maidan, Kiev’s Independence Square, talking to people from all walks of life: students, Cossacks, doctors and volunteers, gathering their testimonies to create a verbatim piece that would tell their story to the world.

Ukraine's unrest began in November, when President Yanukovych refused to sign a cooperation deal with the EU, choosing instead to create a customs union with Russia. Huge crowds of people took to the Maidan square to protest, with police clashes with protestors escalating throughout December and January. In February, thousands more gathered on the square to demand that the president step down.

A week of bloody protests followed, in which 88 people were killed and hundreds injured when uniformed snipers open fired at demonstrators in the square. In a day of dramatic events, the protestors took control of presidential buildings, as President Yanukovych fled the city and Parliament installed an interim president and an election date set for 25 May.

Natal’ya began her association with the Royal Court Theatre, after attending a workshop in 1999, before attending an international residency. Her play The Khomenko Family Chronicles was produced in the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs in 2007.

The Royal Court has worked more widely in Ukraine since May 2011, staging a series of rehearsed readings from Ukraine and Georgia in March 2013, about contemporary life in their countries, bringing together artists working in Georgian, Russian and Ukrainian. Maidan: Voices from the Uprising is presented as part of International Playwrights: A Genesis Foundation Project.