Review: Suomen hauskin mies

Theatre for the executioners

It begins with a nightmare in which the Red executioners step out of their wooden coffins and a huge raven lurks beside them. It ends with a nightmarish image of a group of executed people lying under a giant Finnish flag and P.E. Svinhufvud (Risto Kaskilahti) laying a bouquet of flowers on top of the flag.

The final picture is ambiguous. The events of 1918, which have remained largely unaddressed, are buried under a blanket and on top of that, a birdhouse Finland begins.

Mikko Reitala and Heikki Kujanpää have written the text The Funniest Man in Finland, which will now be seen as a play and next year as a film. The text is an unbridled firework of black humour, shaking up history books with a lot left unwritten in their pages.

Kujanpää has directed both versions. At least the theatrical version takes you away, both with tragic moments and scenes that reach for carnival. The fact that the desolation of the Iso-Mjölö (Isosaari) prison camp is used to create laughter-opening comedy may seem lewd, but it is not.

The text is based on real events in which theatre people and other artists were taken to prison camps. Rough humour was a means of survival. It has been said that a satirical play was performed at the Iso-Mjölö camp about the parliament’s vote on the king.

The two stages of the Helsinki City Theatre are now illustrating the same era with dreams of kings. When the perspective of the big stage settles on the tables of the decision-makers, we are now on the other side, next to the Red prisoners who are on the verge of starvation. They are guarded by guards commanded by Captain Hjalmar Kalm (Rauno Ahonen), who is contemplating his own personal dreams of nobility.

The main character of the play is Toivo Parikka (Martti Suosalo), the director of the Workers’ Theatre and an actor who has excelled especially in comic roles. He and his entire cast are accused and sentenced to death for the murder of the vicar.

Suosalo’s Parikka is the dynamo of the performance. After the initial fumbling expression has dissolved, he takes the space and controls it unconditionally. Parikka blows air into the tired theatre troupe and makes them throw themselves on stage at the risk of their lives.

Heikki Ranta’s Jaeger Lieutenant is a touching role. Friend against friend confronts a young man with a difficult choice.

Pekka Korpiniity’s set design can be used in many ways. Marked by crabapple trees and cliffs, the island has a broken abundance, where every nook and cranny is searched for a chance to survive. The commander’s home and life are on the sidelines, clean and orderly.

Kari Leppälä’s insightful lighting searches, reveals and hides. It moves in the field of death as well as in the deep landscapes of nightmares. It casts an absurd spotlight on a play performed by prisoners, which the commander has commissioned for his guest, Svinhufvud.

Timo Hietala’s music completes the performance both as a background and as a participatory element.

The performance tears all the characters apart without scolding. Everyone has to look at their own attitudes and actions. And the actors, they stretch and bend in their roles.