Russia Projects

In 2019, Bond Street Theatre initiated a five-week cultural exchange program in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Working with refugee and migrant teens from Afghanistan, Cameroon, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia, we conducted a program that engaged teens as advocates for inclusive societies and equipped them with the creative tools to champion tolerance and mutual understanding through the arts!

"Theatre made me more self-confident... and more funny too!"
- Sergei, Cameroon, age 16

• Trained 25 refugee and migrant teens (age 12-17) in Bond Street's social theatre techniques.
• Trained 3 members of Deti Peterburga (Children of St. Petersburg), a non-profit organization that helps women and children integrate into Russian society through language courses and arts programming.
• Created an original performance with 9 of the teens, which revealed their feelings of being isolated and excluded in their new home. The new play, titled Prosto Poniat (Understanding is Easy), was created by and featured the teens and included three members of Bond Street Theatre.
• Toured the show across the city to 9 locations, reaching over 250 people.

"It helped me to understand the opinions of different people regardless of age, race, nationality, language, etc."
- Mukhabat, Tajikistan, age 15

Although migrants and refugee families contribute to the growth and development of Saint Petersburg, the current sentiment of “Russia for the Russians” has intensified each year, and the level of tolerance among the local population has declined. Theatre training encouraged teens to share their voice!  Revealing their feelings of being outcasts in a new country at this crucial time in their lives has encouraged empathy and understanding in audiences. After the post-show discussions, young audience members clamored around them for autographs and selfies - now, they feel like “rockstars”!

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"There are a lot of messages in just one small piece of theatre and that's the reason people and I love theatre"
- Sergei, Cameroon, age 15

Performance Synopsis

The performance opens with the group trying to create a tower with little success, since each person is speaking in a different language: Pashto, French, English, Uzbek, Tajik and Russian.  Two narrators - one an optimist and one a skeptic - debate the idea that people can confront their prejudices and manage to get along. They continue their debate through a variety of scenes that illustrate the difficulties of being a teen in general, and the situation of being an outsider trying to fit in in a new country.  

"I enjoyed most that we succeeded to everything together - we succeeded to make a castle."
- Sarvinoz, Tajikistan, age 12