Ambiorn Happy, Kulturnyt.net
22. october 2023.
Review of 'The Arctic Summit': It's action. Excitement. Multiculture with several languages on stage. It's humor and it's serious. 4 older actors are on stage, plus the young
The play is refreshing in its story about Greenland's struggle for freedom. It's a 4 star play. But because I'm an old white Dane, I have to rate it for 5 stars and add an apology. Unfair, because the play is characterized more by a fiery fight for freedom than traditional dramaturgy, but Greenland has had too little for 200 years. This is what it is like, to be Denmark's Gaza Strip, Denmark's Crimean peninsula, Denmark's cotton plantation, Denmark's colony. You get too little, while Denmark's royal family smiles lovingly, and Danish companies earn billions from running the colony of Greenland. So it is fair with the 5 stars rating.
Kim Leine has written the piece. He is fond of facts, and this really hurts the whites in the audience, while the Inuits in Teatret Svalegangen laugh happily. I did not know that Denmark is a rogue state which in 1953 made Greenland a county (!) in order to circumvent the UN's demand to release the colonies. There is so much I don't know, so I feel safe in Kim Leine's universe.
Aviana Steinbacher has charisma, and her belly is packed with dynamite. It is so cosy in the TV studio. The American Ambassador. The Danish Prime Minister. Oligarch Maxim from Russia. Isak, the Greenlandic chairman of the relatively few local politicians. They don't respect her. In their eyes she is just a young Greenlandic woman, "you can take my suitcase and get me a cup of coffee!" But the young woman has other plans. The TV studio is locked off, the building has already been filled with dynamite. Now she wants Russia, the US and Denmark to agree to make Greenland free again.
They haven't been for hundreds of years. The Norwegians, the Swedes, the Vikings and the Danes have run around on 'the world's largest island' (You would never call Europe the world's largest island, would you?). Ran around and made Greenlandic women pregnant, so nobody in Greenland really knows how much Greenlandic blood they have in their veins. (This is also how it is to be Dane. 1800 years ago we chased the original Danes north of the Limfjord, where they still live, the Cimbri. The rest of us are an orgy of Swedes, Germans and Mongols. Such is the blood of a real Dane.)
Not everything has to be about Aviana Steinbacher, but she delivers a captivating and sensitive portrait on stage of this dilemma: 'Who am I? I have both Greenlandic and Danish blood in my veins! It tingles under my skin. Burns in me. I want to throw my Danish blood away'.
You can't do that, but with a little luck you can throw the Danish colonial masters into Nuuk's harbour. Or make them slaves on one of the shrimp boats from Royal Greenland which help raise money for the island. Maybe hire the Danes as school teachers, doctors at the hospital, police officers and home security personnel?
The forced marriage between Denmark and Greenland is cracking at the seams. The young will be free. There are so few people in Greenland that they are fewer than the original inhabitants of Kuwait. Maybe they can become just as rich if they are ready to risk the pure nature with uranium mines and oil drilling?
It is complicated. The young say, "no, it's easy! We will be free." On stage, Greenland will be free again. The play 'The Arctic Summit' is thus inspiring for the freedom struggle in Greenland. It has not been seen before (I think), and in that way Greenland is already free again after the premiere at Teatret Svalegangen. Fight for freedom unfolds through art.
Thank you for that experience.
The Arctic Summit by Kim Leine
Direction Hanne Trap Friis
Starring Klaus Geisler, Helene Kvint, Aviana Steinbacher, Mette Kolding, and Mikhail Belinson.
Scenography Signe Krog
Sound design Hans-Ole Amossen, Tuomas Rounakari
Lighting design Morten Ladefoged
Video design Michael Lindskov Jacobsen
Costume Design Marianne Meyer
Produced by Teater FreezeProductions.
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