New play explores how each generation parodies the last

A new two-person play by Mart Kangro and Priit Põldma asks whether it is possible to say anything today without sounding like a parody of oneself. The production, “Paroodia,” premieres on Friday at Von Krahli Theatre in Tallinn, ERR reported.

The performers bring their 20-year age difference and contrasting experiences of growing up to the stage. Kangro is 52 and Põldma is 32.

“When Mart began working, the world opened up and opportunities kept appearing. Borders opened, capitalism and democracy arrived, and all the rest,” Põldma told ERR’s “Aktuaalne kaamera” programme. “When I became an adult, my experience was somewhat the opposite. Opportunities began to close or narrow. The world started to contract.”

Põldma said his generation came of age against a backdrop of accumulating crises over the past decade, including the coronavirus pandemic and wars.

Kangro said the two began by examining how young people interpret their time, looking at views ranging from those of Karl Ristikivi to those of people in their 20s today. They also interviewed people from different age groups.

“It emerged that each generation is, in some sense, a parody of the one before it,” Kangro said. “There is a similarity, and a tragedy in the fact that each time it seems like a new discovery.”