The 2025 season proved to be a period full of challenges, political turbulence, and upheaval for Georgian theatre. The severe political crisis in the country, which undermined the firm foundations of Georgia’s pro-Western orientation and intensified signals aimed at dismantling democratic values, had a direct impact on the arts, including theatre. Against the backdrop of increasing repression by the authorities and attempts to suppress critical voices, Georgian theatre faced a difficult choice: to remain silent or to embrace the path of resistance. The majority of state-funded theatres chose a path of self-censorship. Yet, against this silence, the outspoken, steadfast, and creatively strong stance of independent theatres became even more prominent. Independent theatre companies and artists transformed their creative energies into political activism, voicing a clear protest against extreme injustice and violence – a series of events that transcend the local context and resonate with broader global crises. Despite reduced or completely halted funding and extremely difficult working conditions, the forefront of Georgian theatre today has managed to channel its creative resources into a powerful form of uncompromising protest, a form that has opened a new chapter in the history of Georgian theatre. It is no coincidence that the independent theatre scene has become the space where the most significant theatrical processes in Georgia are unfolding today, processes that create not only a new theatrical language but also political and civic positions. “Art is alive and independent!” – a message that has become the common slogan of numerous artistic protests held in Georgia, naturally resonates with the central theme of this year’s showcase: “Freedom is ours today.”
Gega Gagnidze’s original play Joseph, based on motifs from Franz Kafka’s novel The Trial and performed at Atoneli Theatre, is both a sharp political commentary and a genre experiment. Through elements of the absurd, dark humor, and dystopian aesthetics, it delivers a powerful protest against contemporary authoritarian systems. The spatial limitation to a single room – Joseph’s transparent plastic apartment – serves as a potent metaphor for the symbolic destruction of individual privacy and the all-encompassing control mechanisms permeating every facet of existence, so extreme in reality that they no longer even require metaphor. With a roboticized environment, mechanized rhythms, and stylized costumes, the director creates a world where the individual ceases to exist, replaced only by “numbered” subjects selected and manipulated by the system. The process depicted in the performance leads nowhere and continuously restarts, as if the audience is engaged in a video game where the protagonist repeatedly attempts to survive a script whose inevitability is already predetermined. Ultimately, the action transforms into a simulacrum of a game lost within a dream. The onstage process is strictly cyclical: time dissolves, identity disintegrates, and justice as an idea becomes a tool of absurdity. The performance is at once a utopia and a prophecy of what has already been experienced. The precise and highly skilled acting by Giorgi Sharvashidze, Natalia Gabisonia, Giorgi Giorgashvili, and Niko Pipia, alongside Mariam Dzmanashvili’s minimalist-conceptual scenography and stylized costumes, as well as Noe Kvirkvelia’s original music, deserves special recognition. Gega Gagnidze’s Joseph stands out as a remarkable example of contemporary Georgian theatre, which, with its radical approach to form and language combined with political timeliness, succeeds in transforming the critique of power into a new visual language.
Shakespeare’s Hamlet, directed by Sandro Kalandadze for the independent theatre company Haraki, appears, paradoxically, as both a theatrical experiment and an interpretation in close dialogue with tradition. The production is based on a new translation by Lela Samniashvili, with textual additions by Mariam Megvinite. The three-act structure, performed in non-traditional theatrical spaces, offers the audience not only a re-evaluation of Shakespeare’s text but also the opportunity to explore it spatially and metaphorically. Sandro Kalandadze’s production presents a decidedly political interpretation. However, Beka Khachidze’s Hamlet does not function as a symbol of political or moral resistance; instead, he evokes a Sarah Kane-esque antihero – detached, indifferent, and volatile. He oscillates between hero and antihero, no longer serving as a measure of truth amid the surrounding absurdity and violence. Consequently, he is unable to restore order and, from the second act onward, exits the theatrical space to enter the streets, an act that becomes not only metaphorical but also a direct political statement within the performance. The fragmented identity of Hamlet in the production is shaped through a duality performed by two actors: Beka Khachidze’s passive, alienated Hamlet and Anano Makharadze’s active, vibrant Hamlet, who appears to play the role expected of Hamlet. This is not merely a formal experiment but a probing inquiry into the question: Who is Hamlet today? One of the production’s standout moments is Anano Makharadze’s brilliantly performed “The Mousetrap” scene (text by Mariam Megvinite), “Ha,” which goes beyond Shakespeare’s concept of “the play within the play,” becoming a standalone piece and serving as the emotional and symbolic core of the performance. Drawing on Jan Kott’s analysis, this production transcends Hamlet’s canonical dilemma, “To be, or not to be,” by foregrounding the evocative declaration, “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” This line forms the conceptual foundation of the performance, resonating deeply with the prevailing social and political conditions in Georgia.
Levan Tsuladze’s production The Nose, staged at the Theatre Factory 42 and based on Nikolai Gogol’s short story of the same name, is a political satire with tragicomic elements that openly and ironically reflects on the shifting dynamics of power in present-day Georgia. Nikolai Gogol’s story, inherently grotesque as a reflection on the absurdity of bureaucratic systems, is transformed in Tsuladze’s stage interpretation into a direct metaphor for contemporary Georgian political reality. Tsuladze’s production, which combines elements of buffoonery, farce and clowning with minimalist scenography and colorful costumes, wraps the performance in a lighthearted veneer that conceals a profound critique: how mere status and formal authority supplant genuine human values. The loss of the nose goes beyond absurdity and identity crisis, symbolizing the total disappearance of the self. What begins as comedy slowly turns into biting sarcasm, as the power seeker ultimately becomes destroyed by the very system they pursue. A clownish trio leads the audience through the tragicomic routine of a petty bureaucrat’s self-serving life. At once jesters, Shakespearean witches and narrators, they open the performance with scathing mockery of the protagonist and conclude with a grim reminder: “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.” The disgraced bureaucrat, awakened from a dream, ultimately returns to his nightmare – the very routine he briefly seemed to escape, yet which resumes unchanged. Levan Tsuladze’s The Nose is imbued with irony and melancholy, presenting a sharp allegorical critique of power structures. While the production goes beyond its immediate cultural context, it remains acutely attuned to the socio-political reality recognizable to Georgian audiences.
FOLKS, created by Maka Chkhaidze, is an inclusive contemporary dance performance developed in collaboration with the InForm platform and the German company SZENE 2WEI. It represents a significant contribution to the Georgian performing arts scene. This piece stands out as both creatively accomplished and choreographically refined, while bearing significant social importance. It emphasizes the importance of accessibility in the arts, equal engagement, and the coexistence of diverse bodies within a shared performance space. In the performance, the body replaces the word, movement replaces the narrative, and the dynamics of action give way to the aesthetics of physical coexistence within a common space. Equal participation of performers with diverse physical abilities creates an expressive, rich, and emotionally charged stage fabric that precisely conveys the core message of this production: safe spaces are shaped by empathy, acceptance, and care. FOLKS is a remarkable example of inclusive choreography, a rare direction within the Georgian performing arts industry, where the stage breaks free from its traditional role as a mere venue for performance to become a space of experimentation, coexistence, and care. In a context where the full integration of artists with diverse abilities into the creative process remains infrequent – due to the absence of cultural policy frameworks or simply the indifference of decision-makers – InForm’s work pioneers the future, serving as a valuable model of how art can effect tangible social change.
Who’s Gonna Heal Our Wounds is a multimedia performance created by an independent queer-feminist art collective, demonstrating the vital necessity and transformative potential of feminist and queer theatre in the contemporary Georgian art scene. This performance was created within a sharply polarized socio-political environment, where queer, female, and woman-identifying bodies are systematically repressed against a backdrop of hostile policies, violence, and laws shaped by language of hatred. Within this context, a collective of six women artists transforms their voices and personal histories into an active strategy of resistance. The work is hybrid in form: text, video, sound, installation, and performance elements combine to create a non-hierarchical theatrical fabric where no narrative symmetry exists. Instead, the performance embraces aesthetics of fragmentation, trauma, and disintegration. It is a theatre that rejects the idea of a performance as a closed structure and creates a space where bodies directly confront repressive realities. The existence of feminist and queer theatre in contemporary Georgia is itself a political act. In this sense, the performance is not only a compelling example of multimedia art but also a voice that is constantly, yet unsuccessfully, silenced. The collective’s experimental work opens new pathways for the development of Georgian performing arts and clearly demonstrates how feminist and queer art can contribute to shaping a new social and cultural order.
The 2025 Georgian Theatre Showcase program gains further diversity – including in form – with Mechanism, a choreographic-rhythmic performance by Nika Kokhreidze, staged at the independent venue City Theatre. The performers employ their bodies and everyday objects with impressive precision and technical skill to create a compelling experience of physical theatre. The absence of décor and the empty space shift the audience’s focus onto the actors’ physical abilities and stage discipline. Their movements define the rhythmic structure of the performance and create a stage environment based on sound and motion. Built on the aesthetics of play and physicality, Mechanism stands as a notable example of the evolving directions within physical theatre in Georgia, demonstrating how a powerful performative experience can be achieved within a minimalist framework, with storytelling driven primarily through the performers’ bodies and the use of everyday objects.
Ana Kvinikadze