The production ‘Give us a smile, O Lord’ after Grigory Kanovich’s novel adopted for stage and directed by Rimas Tuminas is performed at Barbican Theatre. The play is created in collaboration with the set designer Adomas Jacovskis and the composer Faustas Latenas.

The story is full of allegories, poetic imagery and a deep sense of humanity.

“Wherever we traverse, wherever we go — we are for our children. And our children are traversing and going further and further away from us… And we shall not meet them ever…” (a quote from the play).

The characters experience twists and turns of fate. The road to Vilnius is hard, but what is much harder are our memories of the past full of hardships and wrongs, thought of death which is waiting to everyone, recollections of dreams that never became true, reminiscences of irretrievable losses…

These memories embrace everything but happiness and hope. But might be a miracle will come, and a Palestinian will reach his Promised Land, and Efraim’s son will be justified, and Avner will turn to a tree and obtain salvation. Might it happen? Just give us a smile, oh Lord!

Rimas Tuminas: “This is an eternal theme.  It is clear that there is no Promised Land, but there is something sacred for everybody, there is a world created for us, there is life, and all of us are eager to live. We have become cosmopolites, travelling, going somewhere not realising sometimes, where and why, but knowing we should go. Each time preparing for a trip, even for a short one, we believe in finding something better at the end of the journey. Road purifies us. ‘Give us a smile, O Lord’ is a road for a smile. We’ll share a cart, one cart for all of us”.

Chelyabinsk: February 7 and 8, 2020.

Tyumen: February 11 and 12, 2020.

Cast for Chelyabinsk: Vladimir Simonov (Efraim Dudak), Alexei Guskov (Šmulé-Sender Lazarek).

Cast for Tyumen: Sergey Makovetsky (Efraim Dudak), Evgeny Knyazev (Šmulé-Sender Lazarek).

In both cities: Viktor Sukhorukov (Avner Rosenthal), Grigory Antipenko (“The Palestinian”), Victor Dobronravov (Khloyne-Genekh), Yulia Rutberg (The She-goat).