The Showcase Is To Feed From Academic Research And Knowledge, But It Is Hands-On Job Rather Than Dry Research

Interview with Handan Salta – co-founder of the Istanbul Theatre Showcase – TheatreIST, theatre critic, literary translator.

Handan Salta is a freelance critic and translator. She taught courses on English, dramaturgy, theatre history, text analysis, theatre criticism, and Turkish theatre at Istanbul University and Maltepe University. She has a Ph.D from Istanbul University’s Theatre Criticism and Dramaturgy Department. Her dissertation was a comparative study on Feminist Theatre in the West and in Turkey. She is a member and former vice president of IATC Turkey. She has published her reviews in magazines and in eminent internet portals in Turkey for many years as well as translating plays by Zeynep Kaçar (Genuine People/Plastic Deaths), Vittoria Francesci (Mate in Three), Joseph Robinette & Ron Jones (The Third Way), Edward Bond (Lear), Arnold Wesker (I am Talking about Jerusalem & Chicken Soup with Barley), Chisa Hutchinson (Dead and Breathing), Ruth Tang (My Future Wife), Sarah McDonald Hughes (How to Be a Kid), Karol Horák (La Musica), Anestis Azas (Dogs)…

Ivanka Apostolova Baskar: What motivated you to initiate and form the Theater Ist showcase, which has one specific focus – a contemporary independent theater and performing arts scenes in Istanbul?

Handan Salta: It was our beloved friend Ragıp (May he rest in peace) who initiated the showcase right after the pandemic. Independent theatre makers were in dire straits during the pandemic and they had almost no support from the state. There were several theatre venues that had to be closed down due to their debts. Ragıp was also in the commission run by the Ministry of Culture and he knew very well which groups were being supported which ones were not. Again, in those days a new collective was founded by the name of “Let our theatre live” and he was a part of it too. Those little initiatives were all steps being made to help independent companies survive because there was a huge lesson behind. Formerly a critic and later on a director, Ragıp wanted to bring some lightness and hope to the existing atmosphere. Years ago, after coming back from Avignon, we wanted to organize a festival outside İstanbul, namely in Çanakkale which also connects the two continents but we could not make ends meet then. Three years ago, Ragıp started looking for funding and gathered us to choose the performances/plays and our connections from festivals abroad. The first one was a miracle, his being in the hospital and our running from one place to the other without knowing that he would pass away about a month later. When the showcase was over and people seemed to be happy with what they saw here it gave us all enthusiasm to go for the second round.

Theatre literature from Türkiye is not very well-known abroad and we wanted to change that too. So, we came up with a translation project and the first step was made in Slovakia. Three plays by playwrights from Türkiye were translated into Slovakian and four plays from Slovakian into Turkish. Now we are negotiating about a few plays to be translated into Romanian and a few into Macedonian as you know of.

During the second showcase we invited local theatre festival organizers from different cities to see the program, share their experience and meet international guests and exchange ideas.

So, all what we did and tried to do is closely related to the realm of independent theatre, their attempts to witness, document, react, criticize the reality. Despite all odds they are eager to make theatre with a fresh hope and only they dare to say something serious about what is going on here and now. Although the zeitgeist is changing rapidly, they are still the freshest breath in theatre here.

IAB: As organizers, what advantages and difficulties do you face in your struggle to initiate and to maintain continuity?

HS:  Most important difficulty is the lack of funding. Although İstanbul municipality is the main sponsor, the resources are quite limited. We are still in the process of institutionalization and when it is done it will be easier to apply for funding. Since our activity is limited to a very niche area, we have a hard time finding sponsors. While in other countries, even state-sponsored theaters are being allocated very high budgets for support, here we have achieved the impossible. To be more precise I can give an example; last year, our website, promotional brochures were all “home-made” and the budget was met with equity.

Another problem is that the theatre companies that are selected and invited to festivals have difficulties in accessing the resources to cover these costs. The funds for those companies are not reachable since we are not an EU member.

We could not make a strong debut within these circumstances so our credibility is not strong yet. Neither the theatre makers nor the potential sponsors are not convinced of the importance of this showcase. Most of the time I find myself trying to convince people about it. So, we need a very efficient social media team.

IAB: How do you program thematically or contextually each new edition of the theatre showcase and according to what criteria do you select the shows and productions that are represented in the program for each new edition?

HS: Since the second showcase we have formed a selection committee and we choose the performances out of the ones that apply after the open call. Last year we had around 100 applications and it was tough to choose only 12 of them. We are lucky when it comes to variety of the performances as there is never a dull moment in this country and inevitably theatre makers are not short of topics. We try to choose the ones with an international appeal despite the subtitles. Some references are not easily graspable if you are not familiar with the culture. There you have three choices; either you give some background information to the international audience, have an after-talk session or choose another production. We have opted for all the options in different situations.

Secondly, we tend to choose plays either written by local playwrights or adaptations of acknowledged texts. There are always exceptions though.

The feedback from the guests (just like you did in this interview) makes you look at your own reality from a different perspective. Every year our criteria develops, and opens up. We have not started to choose the plays or dance performances through a theme yet but every year it automatically occurs depending on the political agenda of the country.

IAB: In what circumstances do you choose the locations (venues) for the showcase performance, they are so many and so very versatile – they are dispersive, they are fascinating, they are all over Istanbul and Istanbul is a magnificent metropolis which opens to us from one location to another venue?

HS:  If the theatre company has a venue, we tend to use that. However, most companies do not have a venue of their own and in this case Istanbul Municipality offers their venues scattered around İstanbul. Last year another private enterprise generously offered their venues to us. So far, it was the furthest destination but it was worthwhile, we saw three different performances in the same compound which used to be a shoe factory in the past and presently being used as a plato in which there is a guided tour. As you mentioned İstanbul is a huge city and we try to organize the days and the performances accordingly with the venues. Theatres on the Anatolian side are mostly packed around Kadıköy and on the European side around Taksim which is close to our hotels.

Photo credits: Handan Salta.

IAB: The theater artists in Istanbul, the independent stage, apropos the context, are impeccable actors/actresses – who energetically hold our attention on a high vibration from beginning to end; they speak bravely about many current problems and dilemmas – feminism, homosexuality in conservative circles in Turkey, or they expose the current female agonies through the dramatic modern classic as a subtext of free expression through the already established dramatic fiction. The physical theater in a fascinating way distills sounds and noises from the modern everyday life of Istanbul transformed into super modern performances with a European spirit. But no one spits on authorities (political, parental, divine, profane, historical, present, artistic… authorities), aware that the problems are generated by us, the people, who do not have official authority and supremacy, but different roles and responsibilities in various and specific life existences and co-existences?

HS: Actually, this question is very interesting, I mean it depends a little bit on where you look at it. During the showcase, another guest kept asking the same thing. He kept asking me, “Don’t have political theater?” and I kept asking,” don’t you think it’s political?” I think you actually made a good point; we talk about all the problems but we don’t say that the source of the problems is something systemic. The actors may be skipping this section by self-censoring in some way, or they may think that there is no need to announce the obvious. This is not a surprise for Turkish audiences who know the background of the stories told, but if it raises such a question mark for those who do not live here, it is worth thinking about because not all of the plays you watched had an abstract narrative.

Increasing oppression in media, art, academia -you name it- lead you to self-censorship of course and people turn into themselves to find out stories. So, personal stories in monodrama forms, meta theatrical narratives have become very popular as well as more politically focused, engaged plays on an abstract level.

To answer your question, I can put forward two reasons; first as I mentioned above self-censorship and the second is related to their audience. Regular theatre-goers of the independent companies are white-collars workers in their 30s or early 40s who do not find it ‘cool’ to be directly political. The authorities are not necessarily saved from criticism, it is done in a more ‘subtle’ way for different reasons.

IAB: Qualitatively, structurally, thematically, evolutionary or revolutionary, what do you notice from year to year regarding the development of independent theater production in Istanbul?

HS: Let me give you a few topics; Independent theaters closely follow the national agenda. Issues such as femicides, violence against women, urban transformation, the LGBTQ movement and rights find a place in the plays. In addition, problems related to the theater artists’ own professions are among the frequently seen themes.

The fact that the most performed classics of recent years are Macbeth and Othello is an important indicator of our relationship with power. In the interpretations of both plays in relation to the Turkish agenda, there are elements of truth that cannot be explicitly stated but are implied.

There are several acting schools and each year almost a hundred students are graduating and an important number of them are starting their own theatre companies. Some resist against time though most of them fade away.

Since the actor cannot make enough money to survive and they need to work elsewhere, when you see a beautiful and successful play you do not know if they will be around the following year. If one of the cast is offered a role in a TV series inevitably they accept the offer.

We watch several monodramas every year and it has practical and economic reasons.  Those productions are easier to go on a tour, perform in smaller venues and cost less to the company.

The era of producers has just started in the independent theatre I must state. Investors, some of whom are far from theatre, developed an interest in the independent scene for various reasons. Those productions can be compared to Netflix series, easy to digest, quick to be forgotten, including some celebrities from the television world. Young graduates of acting schools are also fans of this type of theatre which I would call fast-food productions and of course it is a consumer-provider based relationship.

IAB: In your accompanying showcase program, you also invite international guests from the global theater world, who perform master classes, lectures, workshops with the students of drama academies in Istanbul? You also represent international theater festivals in Turkey (in front of international guests) that are active in cities outside of Istanbul. The combination/the merging of local and international programming works very constructively?

HS: Yes, we want this showcase to contribute to several positive encounters. Local festival makers are also facing the problems we face. We just want them to see a good selection of plays in case it might help them in their selection process. Furthermore, they can meet other festival makers both from Türkiye and abroad to share experience, exchange ideas and co-operate. This year we are planning to make a more structured program for local festival makers.

IAB: You are an extraordinarily functional team of organizers composed of enthusiastic, positive university professors, critics, assistants and students –  all working hands on during the festival (I come from a country where university professors behave like pharaohs); working/teaming without snobbery, but an abundance of love to organize everything as it should be and to invite as many credible international professional audiences as possible to enjoy the domestic performances, the exposure of the artists, the soul of the city, and when there is time in-between, to have a good fun-time, that is very important and human?

HS: Thanks for your appreciation, that’s exactly what we wanted to do. Having worked in academia I personally dislike it a lot because of the tendencies you mentioned above. What we are doing with the showcase is to feed from academic research and knowledge but it is a hands-on job rather than dry research. In a similar way that theatre is feeding from life, we are feeding from theory as well as our experience and our world view; footnotes are sometimes quite dreary isn’t it?

IAB: In the month of April, the third edition of Theater Ist (07-13.04) follows, what are you programming and preparing for the year 2025?

HS:  This year’s program is again rich in productions dealing with the past, traumas of all kinds.

Photo credits: Handan Salta.

IAB: Handan, as a translator of prose and dramatic texts and a theater critic – what do you pay attention to and how do you approach when translating a dramatic text versus your approach to contemporary theater criticism?

HS: When I am translating play texts I do it out of my own will, I am a freelancer and nobody is paying me to translate any text. After the translation process, I try to find theatres to stage my translation. So, it is quite out of my whim, and it relies on what I find interesting and eligible for Turkish society’s agenda. Of course, I dream of a potential audience just like I do when I write my reviews. I do not call it criticism anymore because in recent years I tend to write shorter reviews with thick content. In an age of visuals, videos, nobody is patient enough for long texts. By the way, it is harder to reflect your thoughts in a subtle way in a relatively shorter text. Having said that in such a long interview is quite ironic, isn’t it?

IAB: Share with us a map (names) of the most prominent female playwrights in Turkey today (how and what they are writing about), and how many of them have or do not have a problem and opportunity being staged / placed on the theater stages?

HS: I would rather talk about it in another interview, because I believe it will take up a lot of pages. That way we both guarantee another session of showcase and interview respectively.

IAB: From your perspective as a theatre critic, how is IATC Turkey functioning today and is the role of contemporary theatre criticism credible in Turkey today?

HS: Ah, another tough question! This is another problematic issue in my country. A theatre critic means a person with a good background of theatre, a good command of language and writing skills and a descendant of a wealthy family since it is not a paid job. If we are talking about a thumbs up-thumbs down business, you get paid since you are serving the industry (by becoming a critic of those fast-food productions). Let’s put the joke aside but the number of critics is not parallel to the increasing number of independent theatres in İstanbul. Every night there are about 150-200 theatres performing but only a small portion of them are really covered. And when there is a review about the performance it is mostly a praise and does not reflect the truth in most cases. In other circumstances it is either an interview or a review written for publicity. The sharp and wise eye of the critic seems to have gone missing. In harsh economic conditions it requires effort and sacrifice to make theatre and this needs appreciation but a critic should do what their job requires to do. Apart from being a non-profit job, theatre criticism is not considered necessary I feel often. If you are expected to express your admiration and appreciation only, you are not really needed, your friends and family can do it better.

There are two departments at two different universities of theatre criticism in Türkiye; one founded in 1992 in İstanbul the other founded in Düzce in 2018. I am one of the first graduates of the former one in İstanbul and from my generation few people are still writing criticism in various mediums but recent graduates are fewer and it seems they have difficulty in finding a good reason for taking criticism as a job. There were a few efforts to make after talks organized by IATC Turkey in the past and if it was permanently organized we could have created a climate of healthy criticism with the support of the audience. But I heard of a group of young people in Ankara who got together to see and talk about the plays they saw on Facebook, but have not found them yet. Some young theatre companies are also complaining about the lack of criticism. We should make it together with the creative team and critics as the most experienced audience to make history of what is shown on the stages. In the showcase we try to raise awareness towards criticism as well. Savas Patsalidis, (besides many hats he is wearing) the editor in chief of Critical Stages gave criticism workshops in the Showcase both in 2022 and 2024. Last year we had a second critic – Esther Slevogt from Nahctkirik – for a workshop as well. So we as TheatreIST are doing our best to keep criticism involved and on the agenda. Next year we have a bigger plan to combine the Showcase and criticism but let’s not spoil the surprise.

IAB: Thank you very much dear Handan Salta.

Interviewer Ivanka Apostolova Baskar

Skopje/Istanbul 2025