CRIME
A response to Crime and Punishment by Feodor Dostoievsky
★★★★★
★★★★
Premiered in May 2014 at the Platform Studio Theatre, London followed by an immediate transfer to the Etcetera Theatre before going on to play In Suceava, Romania in July 2014. In August 2014 CRIME transferred to Unteatru, Bucharest Romania.
1991-1993. St. Petersburg, Russia.
Communism falls. Western Capitalism rises. The student of law believes that the free market economy will bring his country freedom. The family is optimistic about the wealth of the new future. There is mass privatisation. The family is broken by debt. The unemployed man kills himself. Pensions are cut. The student abandons his old mother after she arranges his sister's marriage to a rich man. The single mother sells her daughter's body for a McDonalds meal. The student murders the pawn broker in order to rob her.
CRIME depicts the reality of a country ravaged by deregulated Capitalism. We want to ask why we, the people with the power to vote, continue to allow this violence to happen.
“…CRIME is fucking angry and it’s fucking bleak…and it feels exactly like the play that today’s Britain needs most right now. ” — Andrew Haydon, Postcards from the Gods (click pentru varianta în limba română)
★★★★★
★★★★
Winner of the Special Jury Prize for best performance and Best male actor (Theo St. Claire) at the International Theatre Festival of Suceava, Romania.
Chosen in Iulia Popovici's top picks of Romania's best productions of 2014 in the newspaper Adevărul (article in Romanian)
“…a political manifesto with a perverse logical structure so that the anarchist potential of a cold discourse transpires from the play… Crime does not intend to present solutions, only the morbid degradation of the world in which we live and its destructive effects on humanity.” — Oana Stoica, Dilema Veche (original article in Romanian)
Cast: Theo St. Claire, Oliver Longstaff, Angel Lopez Silva, Mathew Wernham
Writer and Director: Nico Vaccari
Dramaturge: Sînziana Cojocărescu (Koenig)
Costume and Set designer: Robin Soutar
Light designer: Alex Hopkins
Photography by: Sînziana Cojocărescu (Koenig) and Adrian Crăciunescul
A very special thank you to EVERYONE who made it possible to transfer CRIME from London to Bucharest.
“Crime is an extraordinary play because it is extraordinarily angry, without being emotional, it is extraordinarily political, despite the scenes being set in private life, extraordinarily well made, because the minimalism of its means is not a way of adapting to the scarcity of resources, but an aesthetic in itself, making the actor, from the way in which he manoeuvres objects and himself as an instrument, again, the centre of theatrical representation.” — Iulia Popovici, Oberservator Cultural (original article in Romanian)
‘…a deeply political play…’ ‘…Vaccari doesn’t hold any punches…’ ‘…disturbingly violent…’ ‘This isn’t propaganda, this is a provocative attempt to get people thinking.’ ‘Crime is not only intellectually challenging, but emotionally, it’s incredibly difficult to watch…’ — Andrew Haydon, viewsfromthegods.co.uk
“…CRIME challenges you to think, asks you a lot of questions, but it does not give you answers, it does not give out verdicts. You can’t not ask yourself: is it not a crime in itself to get people to such a state of decay that it makes them capable of killing? Is this the world we live in? …CRIME is a cruel political play, of a fierce cynicism, which shocks, but not for the sake of shocking, but because it hurls reality in your face, a reality which many are reluctant to acknowledge or even see. ” — Alexandra Mihalcea, Semnebune.ro (original article in Romanian)
“…leaves us breathless and helpless…’ ‘Political Theatre at it’s very best.” — Philip Herbert, Remotegoat.com
“…CRIME challenges you to think, asks you a lot of questions, but it does not give you answers, it does not give out verdicts. You can’t not ask yourself: is it not a crime in itself to get people to such a state of decay that it makes them capable of killing? Is this the world we live in? …CRIME is a cruel political play, of a fierce cynicism, which shocks, but not for the sake of shocking, but because it hurls reality in your face, a reality which many are reluctant to acknowledge or even see. ” — Alexandra Mihalcea, Semnebune.ro (original article in Romanian)
