New theatre yearbook puts risk at centre

Estonia’s new theatre yearbook explores political, artistic and economic risk across the theatre landscape rather than simply recording the previous year’s major productions and events, ERR writes in a review that originally appeared in Sirp.

Theatre Year 2025 was compiled by Karin Allik and Oliver Issak, with statistics and the chronicle prepared by Tiia Sippol. Edited by Mari Tuuling, translated by Tiiu Sandrak and designed by Maris Lindoja, the 456-page book was published in 2026 by the Estonian Theatre Union and the Estonian Theatre Agency.

In a review published in 2024, Issak described the yearbooks as records of the most important theatre events and creators of a particular year, preserving them for history. The new volume, published only two years later and co-edited by Issak, does not follow that principle as narrowly. It could be something more, the review says.

Allik and Issak have given the publication a substantial makeover. The changes are visual, with a fresh design, lighter covers and an inviting pink colour, but they are also substantive.

Unlike its predecessors, this edition focuses less on documenting the year’s most important productions and events and more on subjects and phenomena that have not received enough attention. These include broader social forces that influence theatre and the cultural landscape, as well as the conditions that make artistic work possible in the first place.

In the book’s introduction, the editors identify “risk” as a possible common theme. Although the contributors were not instructed to write about it, all the texts are connected in some way to the possibility of taking risks, whether political, artistic or economic.

The articles examine who can take risks in the current theatre landscape, what is worth risking and what is not, and what the price and possible outcome of risk might be.

The collection opens with an overview by Anneli Saro and Hedi-Liis Toome of the change in name and identity of Südalinna Theatre, formerly the Russian Theatre. The change involved a clear risk of going strongly against the wishes and tastes of the theatre’s home audience, but an even greater risk would have been failing to respond to the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine.

As a state theatre, it had no other choice, the review says. Its ideological position could not be ambiguous on this issue, and the theatre’s management was replaced along with its name.

However, Saro and Toome note that Südalinna Theatre’s identity remains unclear. Whom is the theatre making performances for, and what kind of theatre should it be? The review suggests that the management, the Russian-speaking regular audience and the smaller Estonian audience each have their own view.

Performances opposing the war, which the Estonian public appears to expect from Südalinna Theatre, do not reach its regular audience. A theatre survey found that most audience members would prefer to avoid political and war-related subjects on stage. Nevertheless, the theatre continues to believe that such productions should be made and performed, even to half-empty or three-quarters-empty auditoriums.

Endla, another state theatre, is also examined in the book. Meelis Oidsalu discussed the principles behind the theatre’s repertoire with its artistic director, Ingomar Vihmar, and quietly but systematically challenges the idea that, as a regional theatre, Endla must primarily rely on potential sales figures and full houses while constantly compromising between artistic work and survival.

Oidsalu stresses that many factors influence the formation of a repertoire. Although the risks are calculated, they still have a place.