Roland Schimmelpfennig's play "For a Better World" and the upcoming play center on the endless war taking place in the jungle. The reasons for the war are incomprehensible, and the participants in the war do not know what they are fighting for: it is a dystopian stagnation, where there is an increasing lack of air and clean water, and the characters experience a psychological and identity crisis. The main theme of the performance is the crisis of human identity in the context of military conflicts and environmental problems. According to the Australian Institute for International Economics and Peace, only 11 countries in the world are currently not involved in any political conflict, despite this century being called one of the most peaceful in human history.

Despite the global damage caused by military actions, the necessity of war is presented to society in a sophisticated, disguised way, various reasons are found to justify it: wars are presented as an inevitable act of self-defense, an effort to preserve territory. In the performance, director A. Areima will develop the idea that man should seek a deep relationship with nature, look at it not from the perspective of destruction, but from the perspective of preservation, perceive himself as a part of it, and not the owner of a defined territory. One of the accompanying themes of the performance is the psychological damage caused by military actions to the soldiers participating in it: the characters of the upcoming performance find themselves in extreme, traumatic, dream-like psychological states, which make them question their identity, the validity of their actions, and question the created world. "For a better world" is a fantastic story that invites the viewer to look at the condensed current social and psychological reality of humanity and face the possible consequences of human irresponsibility.

 

The play was translated from German by Jūratė Pieslytė

The project is supported by the Lithuanian Council of Culture, Cineskope, Cinevera