The cultural richness of Istanbul and the historical depth of theatre came together in this festival.
By Erol Güler, PhD
The Istanbul Theatre Festival, organized by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV), opened its curtains for the 28th time. The festival, curated by Mehmet Birkiye and held between October 22 and November 19, hosted 19 theatre, performance, and dance shows from Türkiye and abroad. Here is a glimpse of what the festival provided to the audiences in 2024. If you plan to be in Istanbul during the same period next year, please look out for what the 29th edition will have to offer at tiyatro.iksv.org.
As it does every year, the festival brought striking examples of world theatre to the audience. The program, which particularly highlights extraordinary Shakespeare interpretations, included works from Germany, France, Romania, Serbia, and Japan. The Schaubühne Berlin, an ensemble that has created great excitement every time it comes to the festival, was at the festival with its Richard III under the management of Thomas Ostermeier after ten years, starring actor Lars Eidinger. Another great director that festival audiences will remember from previous years: Declan Donnellan was at the festival with Hamlet, staged with the Marin Sorescu National Theatre. Nikita Milivojević, who has deeply affected audiences worldwide, was also at the festival with a surreal Macbeth staged with the actors of the Serbian National Theatre. Comédie-Française, considered the world’s most established theatre, made its first visit to Türkiye at the 28th Istanbul Theatre Festival with the play “Hekabe, Not Hekabe,” directed by Tiago Rodrigues, the director of one of the world’s most important theatre festivals, the Avignon Festival. In addition, the festival hosted the grand master of Japanese butoh dance, Ushio Amagatsu, for the first time in our country with his troupe Sankai Juku’s show titled Utsushi, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Japan-Türkiye diplomatic relations.
Within the scope of the 28th Istanbul Theatre Festival, which spread throughout the city, 11 different venues on both sides of Istanbul; Alan Kadıköy, Arter Karbon, Cemal Reşit Rey Concert Hall, DasDas, Erdem Parking Lot, Harbiye Muhsin Ertuğrul Stage, Metrohan, Hope Alkazar, Maximum UNIQ Hall, Üsküdar Tekel Stage, and Zorlu PSM opened their doors to the festival audience.
The festival opened with the play “Inspectors”
After receiving praise in 2023 with the famous play Mikadonun Çöpleri by Melih Cevdet Anday (one of the pioneers of absurdist theater in Türkiye), Tiyatro İN brought the author’s much lesser-known play, “Inspectors,” to the stage. Directed by Engin Hepileri, who approaches this hidden treasure from a contemporary perspective, the play was crowned with Kenan Doğulu’s music.
Schaubühne Berlin returns to the festival after 10 years with the play “Richard III”
One of the most important directors of our time, Thomas Ostermeier and his company Schaubühne Berlin returned to the festival after 10 years with a masterpiece. The director, who opens a new page in theater history with each production, and the company, who have deeply impressed Istanbul Theater Festival followers with their previous productions of Nora A Doll’s House, Hamlet and A Public Enemy, came to Istanbul this time with Richard III, which has taken the world stages by storm. Lars Eidinger, who won the hearts of Istanbul theatergoers with his unforgettable performance of Hamlet in 2012, appeared with the role of Richard III, which he portrays in a spine-chilling seductiveness.He created an unexpected sympathy in the audience for the merciless king and makes the audience complicit in the king’s crimes with all his charm.
The world’s most established theater group, Comédie-Française, at the festival
One of the leading theater artists of our time, Avignon Festival Artistic Director Tiago Rodrigues, combines reality with fiction, the personal with the political, and poetically transforms life with artistic tools. In the play “Hekabe, Not Hekabe,” rewritten after a real event, the search for justice by a mother with an autistic son transcends centuries and resonates today. The Comédie-Française actors, considered the best in France and each described as an “icon,” and especially Elsa Lepoivre in the leading role, bring the characters they take on to life with flawless believability.
The group that has taken the world by storm, Sankai Juku, was at the festival for the first time
Another surprise of the festival, Utsushi, is one of the most striking examples of butoh dance, one of Japan’s gifts to the universal cultural heritage. The six white figures dancing on stage not only offer an impressive visual, but also tell a delicate story about humanity, filled with happiness, sadness, pain, and hope. Ushio Amagatsu, who introduced butoh dance to Europe in the early 1980s, ensured that this dance genre gained a large fan base all over the world with the tours he went on with his group Sankai Juku until he passed away in March 2024. Created upon the intense demand from international festivals, Utsushi is both a retrospective reflection the essence of Amagatsu’s 45-year art and a new work that is complete in itself. Sankai Juku, which has taken the world by storm since the 1980s, came to Türkiye for the first time to meet with the audience as part of the festival on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and Türkiye.
Master director Declan Donnellan returns to the festival after a 20-year hiatus
Shakespeare’s masterpiece Hamlet, which is themed on mortality, corruption, and revenge, is brought to the present day in the interpretation of Declan Donnellan, one of the most important directors of our time, while Nick Ormerod’s simple yet striking stage design allows the audience to experience this story that has been told thousands of times from a brand-new perspective. The performance of the master actors of the Marin Sorescu National Theatre, which has produced many unforgettable plays in its 165-year history, has a different flavor in every detail. The company, which The Guardian newspaper describes as “Whatever their next work is, it is always sure to be a big deal,” is known for its intense, powerful stagings and especially for adding a new spirit to the classics. Declan Donnellan has directed plays for leading festivals such as Edinburgh, Avignon, and Salzburg, and he is the winner of four Oliviers and the Golden Lion Lifetime Achievement Award from the Venice Biennale.
A dream-like Macbeth from the master Shakespeare director
Award-winning director Nikita Milivojević, who manages to deeply impress the audience with his original Shakespeare interpretations and aesthetically provocative directing, delicately shapes a surreal world that is simultaneously timeless and contemporary in Macbeth, which he staged for the Serbian Shakespeare Festival. Serbian director Nikita Milivojević, who has received numerous theater awards in his country during his career spanning 30 years, is the director of the Belgrade International Theater Festival and the founding director of the Serbian Shakespeare Festival. Milivojević, who brings the classics to the 21st century with his bold and innovative interpretations, directed Shakespeare’s play “Henry V” at the Globe Theater; Dostoyevsky’s “Crime and Punishment,” which he staged in Athens, was considered the cultural event of the year, and he was chosen as the Best Director of the Year for Chekhov’s “Three Sisters.” The Serbian National Theater, founded in 1861 during the Austrian Empire, has since been considered one of the most important institutions that have contributed to the cultural identity of the Serbs.
An entertaining look at the present day from Şahika Tekand, the great master of Turkish contemporary theater
Şahika Tekand, who has written her name in world theater history with the unique technique she has developed, ironically addresses concepts such as power, marriage, labor, justice, reason, opportunity, and war through the fear, ambition, and desires that dominate the summit of Olympus with the possibility of Zeus’ death in her new play written and directed for Studio Players, which she founded. The play takes place on a day when the gods of Olympus discuss and try to understand their own situation at the point the world and humanity have reached in the play “Ölüyor mu ne?” (Is he dying or what).
A selection emphasizing women’s production: “This Is a Woman”
A selection of plays that take their subject from women’s stories and/or have women writers, directors, and actors are presented to the audience under the title “This Is a Woman,” in the Istanbul Theater Festival program, in order to make women’s production and women’s perspective more visible.
Questioning the traditional roles of women and men, “A Doll’s House” is accepted as a feminist text on the one hand, and on the other hand, it tells the story of Nora and the struggle of each individual to exist freely against social pressures. Tuğçe Altuğ brings Nora to life “A Doll’s House,’ the first production of Tiyatro Circa, which she founded primarily to tell women’s stories.
The award-winning company Tiyatro BeReZe, in its new production adapted from Chekhov’s “The Seagull,” brings to the stage today’s Chekhov characters who tend to sanctify the past in the shadow of the radical transformations of our age. This delicate play brings both fiction and reality, as well as the past, present, and future, to life on stage.
And finally, a sensational play by Mehmet Birkiye
Kocaeli City Theatres is visiting the festival with “War and Peace,” one of the masterpieces of world literature, which tells the story of three aristocratic families in the midst of war, woven with love, friendship, and betrayal. Helen Edmundson’s adaptation maintains all its magnificence under Mehmet Birkiye’s direction, while focusing on themes that never lose their relevance. Mehmet Birkiye was awarded the Istanbul Theatre Festival Honorary Award in 2023 for his contributions to Türkiye’s theatre not only with his acting and directing but also as an academic, and who took on the role of curator of the festival this year and has put his signature under the play “War and Peace.” ■
The 28th İstanbul Theatre Festival was sponsored by İstanbul Kültür Sanat Vakfı (İKSV), Koç Holding Enerji Grubu Şirketleri Aygaz, Entek, Opet, Odeabank, and Tüpraş.
