Dshamilja

August. Harvest time. Hot days and sultry nights between the gorges and the steppe. August in the Kyrgyz SSR more than 80 years ago. Harvest time during the war. During the last great war. The men of the village are at the front. Women and teenagers take over the work. Fifteen-year-old Seid and Dshamilja, the wife of Seid’s older brother, also haul heavy sacks of grain to the nearest train station. The train carries them to the soldiers on the front lines. Dshamilja’s husband is stationed there too, far from his home village, far from his wife. Seid watches as, during these busy August nights, a secret love grows between Dshamilja and the reserved war veteran Danijar. In his songs, she hears a voice of hope and a love of life. The liberating power of art and the energy of this new love ultimately prepare not only Dshamilja and Danijar, but also Seid, for a new beginning.
“I swear, it’s the most beautiful love story in the world,” raved French author Louis Aragon about the novella by his “Soviet-Kyrgyz” colleague Chingiz Aitmatov. The renowned director, author, and theater artistic director Armin Petras is now bringing “Dshamilja” to the courtyard of the neues theater. Under the open sky, he engages in a dialogue with the characters and the audience about love, art, freedom, work, and the future.