26 – 28 September

Following highly acclaimed runs in Wiesbaden Germany, London’s Finborough Theatre and the Brighton Fringe, Kristin Milward brings her riveting solo performance of The Trumpeter to Rotunda Theatre at the Cheltenham and Gloucester Fringe Festival.

 

Inspired by true events, this new play by Ukrainian writer Inna Goncharova bears witness to Russia’s devastating attack on Mariupol and is also a moving and timeless reflection on the role of art in war.

“I write music, Kolya. Composers always and everywhere write music. Even in the bunker. Even during the war.”

 

Trapped beneath the Azovstal steelworks during the siege, the battered remnants of Ukraine’s 36th Marine Brigade endure the never-ending barrage of Russian heavy artillery. The trumpeter, the only survivor of the Brigade’s brass band, shares the terrifying darkness with two compatriots. As the shells fall threatening death at any second, the trumpeter desperately tries to find the harmony in the noise that will enable him to compose a symphony of war.

This is the second Ukrainian play that Kristin Milward gives as a solo performance. She received multiple 5 star reviews and a “Best Play” and “Best Lead Performance in A Play” nomination in the OffWestEnd Awards for Pussycat in Memory of Darkness, by Neda Nejdana, first performed in 2022 at The Finborough Theatre and again in 2023, after which, it subsequently became the first foreign production to perform in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began, and has been seen internationally in Germany, Portugal, the USA and again on a second visit to Ukraine.

 

Milward states, “A young Ukrainian woman was waiting for me at the stage door at the end of a performance of Pussycat in Memory of Darkness, the first Ukrainian play I performed.  It was a hot August night in 2022 and lots of people were gathered outside, waiting to talk to me.  The girl was in her early twenties, weeping.  She told me she was from the Donbas and started to quote the most lyrical passage of the play to me – in English. When I got home that night, I contacted both the director of the show and the artistic director of The Finborough, saying I wanted to take the play to Ukraine.  I’d given money, but that’s such an impersonal exchange; I wanted to show my solidarity with the Ukrainian people and the best way I could do that was to go. I went in December, when snow was on the ground and the streetlights were dim or non-existent.  There were no Christmas lights, only dark figures plodding through the snow and military checkpoints outside my hotel. My love for the Ukrainian people and my unwavering belief in the justice of their cause took root during that visit and has never wavered.

The impact of Pussycat the previous year was so great that a brand new festival was established that opened its doors in Wiesbaden last February.  I was asked to bring a one person show to Wiesbaden and John Farndon, the translator of Pussycat sent me the script for The Trumpeter. “

Photgraphy credit: Davor Tavorlaza @ The Ocular Creative