Énglish language play premieres at Stoka Theatre

Volume 6, Number

By Matt Reynolds
Spectator Staff

Since 1991, Stoka Theatre has been the angst-ridden teenager in the basement of Slovak theatre that no one knows exactly how to deal with (see article about its director on page ten). To be sure, their performances are puzzling and absurd, but there are is also a lot in them about the nature of life and reality...at least that`s what roughly half the people in Bratislava seem to think. In any event, this uniquely Slovak bit of culture is going to be available in English for the first time on May 19 and 20 , a sort of testing of the waters (or vacuum) of English language performance in Bratislava. 

From a Distance (Z diaľky) is a two person play starring Stoka director Blaho Uhlár and Stoka mainstay Lucia Piussi, dealing mostly with people being pathetic and needy, in short, very human in their emotional excesses. The original performance, in Slovak, is fascinating, and word has it from an insider that the English translation works well. Probably not for the conservative or those put off by the madly untraditional.