No Man's Land

By Alexandra Badea

PREMIERE
October 21, 2016
Michalis Cacoyiannis Foundation, Théâtre à la Grecque Festival
October 26, 2017
Theater «Apo Michanis»

In collaboration with the Theater Company Bouloúki

The border. An imaginary line that separates war from peace, slavery from freedom, «us» from «them,» death from life.

Alexandra Badea, with contemporary and poetic language, with a fresh perspective and enthusiastic pen, explores the concept of the border, the No Man’s Land.

We are transported to Romania in the 1980s and meet Him and Her. Two young people exiled to a village on the edge of the Danube, punished for their revolutionary spirit. They resist. They want to cross the border and touch freedom.

«We leave or stay. We live or die,» they will say, fight their fear, and move forward. Until when? Until when?

We are also taken to Varosha, the region of Cyprus that Attila’s invasion transformed into a ghost town.

We meet Iva, a young German archaeologist who has gone to assist in the recognition of the invasion’s victims. Or maybe to set a border between her and an «unfulfilled love»?

We also meet Adastra, a girl who adamantly refuses to cross the border, will stay here in the no man’s land, and will wait for her beloved. «You said you would come back,» she will tell him.

Badea’s heroes are people who walk on the edge, take risks, and accept it when they lose. They have no right or wrong, no good or bad. They are people who ask questions. Eternal, unanswered questions.

«I sometimes look at the horizon and wonder where I should go. Where do I belong? What do I still owe to humanity? Is there anything left for me to give?»

Dressed in the clothes of refugees, war, and destruction, they fight. For their ideals, for love, for life.

And this is their last word. A beautiful word. «Life.»