Review: Nenä

A HARROWING AND OUTRAGEOUS MASTERPIECE

Five actors stand on stage with their heads bowed. We are in a prison camp and the Sol Theatre in Solovetsky is about to start its performance. Just over an hour and a half takes the viewer into a turmoil of emotions. At times, I laugh with tears in my eyes at the outrageously absurd black humour of the performance, after a while I hold my breath as the prisoners reveal their stories one after the other. Why did they end up in the camp? The lovely Heidi Herala is the star of the evening. Herala interprets St. Petersburg actress Tatjana Homutova with breathtaking skill. He makes the viewer stand with him on a knife edge.

He laughs and cries. In the best scenes at the same time. Herala has the finest scene of the evening with her real-life husband, Seppo Maijala as Sergei Armanov, in which the viewer finds out why Tatyana has ended up in the camp. Maijala amazes the viewer with her wonderful ability to transform, which easily washes Jari Pehkonen and Pekka Huotari, for example.

The nose has welded the five actors tightly together. They breathe at the same pace and give themselves to the performance to the fullest. The nose is an incredible achievement of all five of these actors. A masterpiece that is in a class of its own. It’s arguably the best performance I’ve ever seen on the stage of that theatre.

Gogol’s text is difficult. It challenges the viewer, but that’s why The Nose is an experience, a challenge that rewards the viewer. The absurd humour of the play sometimes goes overboard, but just let it go! Nose is a bold solution in terms of repertoire policy, which gives its brilliant actors the opportunity to put everything they have to give.

The youngest of the five actors, Vappu Nalbantoglu , seems to have grown into this performance as an actress. It is easy to predict that he will be a big star on the big screen as well.

The nose takes the viewer to the origins of theatre. What if the actors still moved the sets themselves? The atmosphere is crystallized when Heidi Herala and Vappu Nalbantoglu play horses. Herala knocks the sounds of hooves with her shoes, while the other is making a knock with wooden spoons. The choreography for the performance has been made by Andrei Art, who has gotten a lot out of the female actors in particular. Flamenco-like movements are very skilful for long-limbed women.

The nose leans on its brilliant actors. With this working group, it would work even if there were only five chairs on stage and these actors.