★★★★

“sixty minutes of haunting storytelling that passes by in a moment, and it’s well worth your time”

On a bare stage in the Omnibus Theatre just off Clapham Common’s North Side, a Ukrainian-born actor named Nikolay Mulakov, part of an independent company called L’Oeil Epissé Sur Ame Pure based in France, walks through the audience. He’s here to perform Vanya Is Alive by a Russian playwright named Natalia Lizorkina, and we, the audience, are here to bear witness.

It is a seemingly simple story about a mother waiting for her soldier son to come home. In playwright Lizorkina’s talented hands, it becomes something much more complex. It becomes an act of resistance to the whole state machinery of war. And Vanya Is Alive may have begun as an act of resistance to Russia’s war on Ukraine in 2022, but it’s becoming more relevant every day in 2025. In the show, a mother, Alya, is declaring war on the state that sent her son away. And the way that she does it is revolutionary. She declares war by talking about happiness, and peace, and being well nourished. It becomes clear that her words describe anything but. She plays videos and memes her son sends from the front line. She listens to forbidden podcasts, and reads forbidden texts. Her final act of resistance before being arrested is to stand in the town centre with the family icon as a mute protest against her son’s pointless sacrifice. “Vanya is alive” she insists, even while it is perfectly clear that he is not.

The beginning of the show is deceptively nonchalant, as actor Nikolay Mulakov walks on stage to ask us how we are, and whether we speak Russian. He slides into Vanya Is Alive casually reciting a list of the characters who are going to appear in the story. The audience barely notices that we have already begun to walk, metaphorically speaking, by Alya’s side. Because there is nothing else to focus on but Mulakov telling Alya’s story, playwright Lizorkina’s words take on great power, despite the seeming simplicity of the language. But there’s always a surprise in Lizorkina’s choice of words, so we pay close attention. (I’m assuming the English translation is a faithful reflection of the original.) Vanya Is Alive is not so much a drama, as a powerful story told dramatically. Director Ivanka Polchenko is wise to present Natalia Lizorkina’s script in such a stripped down manner. It is reflected in the deliberate choice of a “set concept”, rather than a set, by Polchenko and her designer Ksenia Peretrukhina. Scene changes are indicated by lighting changes (designer Eli Marsh).

Vanya Is Alive is sixty minutes of haunting storytelling that passes by in a moment, and it’s well worth your time. There’s something universal about this drama, whether one is Russian, Ukrainian, or anyone trying to describe the sadness of war when your government will only permit you to speak of happiness and peace. Catch it while you can. It’s becoming more relevant every day.

DIMANCHE

Peacock Theatre

★★★★

“the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy”

The Belgian companies Focus and Chaliwaté have brought a co-production to the Peacock Theatre as part of 2025 Mime London. Their show Dimanche is a charming and whimsical piece of visual theatre, featuring puppets, humans, and sets that are both miniaturized and full size. The locations are as varied as an arctic landscape, a desert island complete with tsunami, and the house of an ordinary couple (with grandma) trying to adapt to climate change. This is a show for all ages. Children in particular will appreciate the cute animals which range from polar bears, sharks and flamingoes.

Dimanche arrives in London under the umbrella of Mime London, which specializes in finding companies whose work is hard to categorize. Curators Helen Lannaghan and Joseph Seelig have teamed up to take the place of the London International Mime Festival, which closed in 2023. Mime London is smaller scale than the LIMF, but still adept at bringing intriguing work to brighten a dark and post holiday January. With well equipped theatres such as the Barbican and Peacock hosting the festival, it’s a chance for West End audiences to see work that is usually performed abroad.

The work of Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté in particular resists easy definition. Dimanche features three performers who take on a variety of roles in a series of wide ranging locations. They work as actors, as puppeteers, and even turn into the locations themselves from time to time. The show opens in the arctic. We watch an intrepid film crew document the effects of climate change. Our parka clad team attempt everything from driving in a blizzard to crossing unstable ice. Sometimes the scenes are miniaturized, in which case the body of one performer becomes the snowy landscape. Tiny cars drive over the curves and precipitous bends, headlights blazing through the darkness. When the ice gives way, and the audience finds itself plunged underwater, a video projected onto a screen takes over the action. For most companies, this would be sufficient challenge. But this team is just getting warmed up. From arctic exteriors the audience is transported to a domestic interior where rising temperatures outside make even the most mundane of household tasks fraught with risk. From malfunctioning electrics to melting furniture, we see Grandma and her family attempt everyday activities as though the heat were completely normal. Only when the wind and the rain literally carry the family away do we realize that the joke’s on us. This is what climate change looks like.

Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté manage to pack in an impressive number of climate change vignettes in just over an hour. They present their theme with humour and a lightness of touch that belies the seriousness of the subject. If there’s one criticism, it is that there’s no overarching narrative, which makes it challenging to tune immediately into each scene change. At other times, the scenery (and the show) seems a bit lost on the large stage of the Peacock Theatre. But the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy. The ice is melting, polar bears are being stranded on icebergs, and further south, people are struggling with hotter weather, more violent storms, and seas that threaten everything on land. Dimanche makes its point while beguiling us with cute baby polar bears stranded on icebergs, and flapping flamingos caught in destructive winds.

Dimanche is a delightful show that teaches with its entertainment. Kudos to Mime London for making Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté part of the 2025 line up. See this show if you can. It won’t be in London long!

VANYA IS ALIVE

Omnibus Theatre

★★★★

“sixty minutes of haunting storytelling that passes by in a moment, and it’s well worth your time”

VANYA IS ALIVE

Omnibus Theatre

Reviewed on 4th February 2025

by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Sergey Novikov

Previously reviewed at this venue:

VANYA IS ALIVE

VANYA IS ALIVE

VANYA IS ALIVE

DIMANCHE

Peacock Theatre

★★★★

“the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy”

DIMANCHE

Peacock Theatre

Reviewed on 30th January 2025

by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Mihaela Bodlovic

Previously reviewed at Sadler’s Wells venues:

DIMANCHE

DIMANCHE

DIMANCHE