THEATRE WILL NOT PREPARE YOU FOR DEATH to be Presented at La Mama

"Theatre Will Not Prepare You For Death" is an experimental theater piece exploring death, love and family based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead.  The production is the stage directorial/producing debut of film maker Olga Lvoff, whose previous work is primarily documentaries. Written by Russian playwright Nika Velt and co-directed by Olga Lvoff and Elena Che, it will be performed by a cast of five actors and five dancers and employs Tibetan masks, throat singing, audience interaction, biomechanics and choreography. Diplodocus Arts will present the work September 12 to 15 at La MaMa Shares, 74 East Fourth Street. La MaMa Shares provides theater space for non-curated productions.

The play's story, originally written by Nika Velt from her dreams, is set in a Greek family but could happen anywhere--it is universal. A cosmopolitan family returns from the funeral of its Grandmother, only to find her sitting in the kitchen eating koliva, a dish based on boiled wheat that is used liturgically by Greeks for commemorations of the dead. The family, nonplusssed by this, deliberates what to do and decides to read the Tibetan Book of the Dead to Grandma to help her get to the other side.  In her author's notes, Ms. Velt writes, "I’m a huge fan of magical realism and I dislike being too serious. In this play, I aimed to create something that was a bit scary, a bit funny, and a bit sad."

Velt relates that the play was inspired by a dream he had about a Southeast Asian family (the reasons for this are mysterious) in which an aunt died whose spirit would not depart but lingered with the family, participating in meals, sharing gossip, but refraining from work — it was considered undignified for ghosts to engage in labor. So the family decided to capitalize on a peculiar local practice: selling ghosts to tourists.  Velt originally penned the play in Russian and writes, "I didn’t know enough about Southeast Asia to write about it, so I decided to transfer the story to Russia." She adds, "At some point, I realized the story was a metaphor for guilt, which grows and consumes you. From there, it was easy — I just had to think about what each family member was guilty of." The Tibetan Book of the Dead provided a framework for the story, adding another layer. At Olga Lvoff's suggestion, Velt changed the Russian family to a Greek one to make it more relatable to international and American audiences. She translated the play into English herself (she has a degree in simultaneous interpretation and has earned a living as a translator and interpreter).

The production includes Tibetan Masks which are animated by five professional dancers and choreographed by Marla Phelan. Slowly, with each scene, these performers come onstage to dance and participate in the action. Throat singing is performed by Deniz Erzaim, who appears as one of the masks. Human skeleton statues will be seated throughout the audience. All of this will be at the same time funny and uncanny. Music and lights in the lobby will make it feel otherworldly.

The production, organized, produced and co-directed by film maker Olga Lvoff, is her stage debut. It is philosophically related to her first long-form film, "When People Die They Sing Songs," in which Yiddish songs make an aging Holocaust survivor uncover her past after decades of silence while her daughter races against her mother’s dementia to capture the story. (https://diplodocusfilms.com/when-people-die-they-sing-songs/).  Lyoff  comes from  the  world of  film and  documentary film but  grew  up  surrounded  by the Russian  Theatre  tradition.  This this is  her  first  play and  an  experiment  in layering a  documentarian's realism  with  the theatricality  of  masks, music  and  absurdism.

Ms. Lvoff is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and a member of The European Film Academy. Her recent feature documentary on Dissociative Identity Disorder, “Busy Inside,” aired on PBS (“America Reframed” slot) and was featured in The New York Times. It premiered at Moscow International Film Festival and won the Audience Award for the Best Feature at Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival. “When People Die They Sing Songs,” her first full-length documentary, was broadcast on NHK (Japan), theatrically released in Russia (Documentary Film Center in Moscow), and participated in festivals around the world including DOC NYC (New York) and Message to Man (St.-Petersburg). It was nominated for Student Oscar in and won CINE Golden Eagle Award. Lvoff received an MFA in Social Documentary from the School of Visual Arts in 2013 and leads film workshops at Columbia University and Hunter College.

Playwright Nika Velt is Russian-born and lives in France with her French husband. She was trained in the Scriptwriting Workshop of A. Gonorovsky and is author of four plays. Her "Stars in a Black Hole" was shortlisted at several theater festivals and staged by Ivan Ryabenko at Theater on Liteynyi in Saint-Petersburg in 2021. A precursor to this play, "Bardo Thedol or Grandma you are dead," was shortlisted at several theater festivals and staged by Pavel Artemyev at Quarteater (Moscow) in 2023.  

Marla Phelan (choreographer) is an internationally recognized dance artist based in New York.  Upcoming collaborations include a new work with Emursive Productions and Theater Aspen at the Aspen Music Festival. She recently premiered Obscure Passage, a triptych video installation at Chemistry Creative, and works as a Creative Director at The Mckittrick Hotel, creating expansive immersive events at the iconic home of Sleep No More. She is a 2023 Alvin Ailey New Directions Choreographer, a 2023 LMCC grant recipient and a 2022-2023 Simons Foundation & Gibney Open Interval Resident Artist. Her work has premiered at Lincoln Center, The Joyce Theater, SXSW, Dance on Camera Festival, Future Dance Festival, FringeARTS, WestFest, Dixon Place, Gibney Center and others.

 Elena Che (co-director) earned an MA in Theater from Hunter College in 2012.  Her NY directorial debut was "The Smoke" by Conor McDonald, presented in the Open Hydrant short play festival. She worked at Steps Theater for several years as an actress and director. Recent directorial credits also include "White On White" by Maya Pramatarova and "Baudelaire’s Passion" by Henry Keen. She is a devotee of physical theater, mask work, modern dance, puppetry, mime and Butoh. 

“Theatre Will Not Prepare You For Death” is written by Nika Velt and directed by Olga Lvoff and Elena Che. The actors are Efi Kitsanta, Basil Lvoff, Madeline Naylor, Noah Lang and Kat Shepherd. Dancers are Kelly Milone, Truth Colon, Liana Zhen-ai and Xavier Townsend. Throat singer is Deniz Erzaim. Choreographer is Marla Phelan. Set Designer is Anna Kiraly. Set Design Intern is Elena Lindeman. Composer/Sound Designer is Masha Vasilevskaya. Lighting Designer is Nic Vincent. Costume Designer is Lisa Renee Jordan. Mask Designer and Fabricator is Sean Devare. Producer is Hamilton Clancy. Stage Manager is Vasiliki Ioannou. Support comes from The Drilling Company, Lubimovka Play Festival and Positive Exposure. 

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