The Mariupol Drama Theatre, destroyed in a Russian airstrike in 2022 while hundreds of civilians were sheltering in its basement, is to open its doors again, with Russian occupation authorities heralding the reconstruction as a sign of renewal, while former actors at the theatre denounced the reopening as “dancing on bones”.
The Kremlin has made the reconstruction of Mariupol a calling card of its rule in occupied Ukraine, but Moscow’s oversight is accompanied by arrests or exile of critics, along with property seizures that have stripped thousands of Ukrainians of apartments they legally owned.
The Mariupol Drama Theatre is due to reopen by the end of the month with a performance of The Scarlet Flower, a Russian fairytale, after being rebuilt almost from scratch over the past two years. “The theatre is being reborn together with Mariupol. Russian and Soviet classics have returned to the stage,” said the theatre in a statement about its plans for the future.
Evgeny Sosnovsky, a photographer from Mariupol who worked extensively with the theatre but moved to Kyiv after the Russian takeover, said: “I can’t think of any other word for it than cynicism. There should be a memorial at the site in memory of the Mariupol residents who died during Russia’s capture of the city, not an entertainment venue.”
The strike on the theatre remains one of the most notorious incidents of Russia’s war in Ukraine, with the building targeted despite the fact that “CHILDREN” had been painted in block letters in the square in front of it. At least a dozen people are confirmed to have died, but the real number is likely much higher.
Russia has denied hitting the theatre and claimed the damage was caused by an explosion detonated inside the building, but several independent investigations have suggested Russian air bombs were responsible. Amnesty International concluded that the devastation was “likely caused by Russian forces deliberately targeting Ukrainian civilians” and said the attack should be investigated as a war crime.
“Having entertainment, songs and dances on top of all the bones? I have the feeling that the souls of the people who died there won’t let them perform well there,” said Vira Lebedynska, a former actor at the theatre.
Lebedynska is now based, with a small group of former Mariupol actors, in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhhorod. The calling card of the theatre-in-exile has been a play called Mariupol Drama, which is based on the events in February and March at the Mariupol theatre, and which has toured across Europe over the past year.
“At the beginning, it was really difficult to perform in this, and I wondered why I have to remember all of this, but I carried on and I realised it was my mission to tell the world about what happened there in the theatre,” said Lebedynska.
However, many other actors have remained in Mariupol and are collaborating with the new theatre. “For them, the main thing is acting on stage, and everything else is irrelevant. ‘We are outside of politics’ is their principle. They don’t care where they are, in Russia or Ukraine,” said Sosnovsky.
The theatre’s former director stayed in Mariupol but has been demoted to run the orchestra, while Russian authorities have appointed Igor Solonin, formerly the deputy director of the Donetsk Circus, as the new head.
In an interview earlier this year with a Russian journalist, Solonin repeated claims that the building was blown up from inside. “It was an internal explosion. It was a bomb or an explosive device inside the building, or maybe careless handling of ammunition,” he said. Several people who were in the theatre at the time of the explosion have told the Guardian there were no soldiers or military equipment there.
Russia has undertaken a huge reconstruction programme in Mariupol, after its invasion reduced much of the city to rubble. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, earlier this month signed a decree allowing officials in occupied areas of Ukraine to confiscate homes left empty after their owners fled or were killed during Russia’s invasion.
According to the document, dwellings deemed to show signs of “ownerless property” will be recognised as the property of regional authorities. Compensation is possible only for those who obtain Russian citizenship. There are now more than 12,000 apartments listed as ownerless, according to publicly available files from the Russian-installed Mariupol authorities.
The Guardian spoke to several former Mariupol residents who said their property had been confiscated or was about to be. One, Volodymyr, said he owned an apartment in a building that was destroyed in the fighting and has since been rebuilt by Russian authorities.
“On the door of the entrance, they posted a notice that they were waiting for the owners of the flats, who urgently needed to confirm their ownership or their apartments would be ‘nationalised,’” he said. The only way to make the confirmation would be to travel to Mariupol and take Russian citizenship.
Sosnovsky said he had found his Mariupol apartment on the “ownerless” list, and has accepted he will lose the property. “I know that I will never return to Mariupol. In my lifetime, it is unlikely that it will return to Ukraine,” he said. “My wife and I are already over 60, so it’s unlikely. We are trying to start our lives from scratch in Kyiv. But there is absolutely no help or support from the state.” he added.
One woman from Mariupol, who asked not to use her name, said she had managed to buy “the apartment of my dreams”, a modest flat in a Soviet-era apartment block in Mariupol, and had planned to begin renovations on it a few days before Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
The apartment block was damaged during the fighting, but has since been repaired. The woman asked her father, who still lives in the occupied territory, to take possession of the apartment, but was told that even with a power of attorney, she cannot transfer ownership to her father. “As far as I can tell there is no possibility if you don’t go there and take Russian citizenship,” she said, a step she is not willing to take.
It is not only those who have left Mariupol for Ukrainian-controlled territory who are struggling to establish their property rights. Earlier this month, a woman who identified herself as Anna Guzevskaya, a Mariupol resident with three children, recorded a video appeal to Putin saying her house had been destroyed. Although this should have made her eligible for a new apartment, she had instead only been offered cash compensation which was nowhere near enough to buy a new apartment.
“How should I explain to my children, that in the newly built apartment block there is no longer our apartment, where they have lived since their birth,” she asked Putin.
Lebedynska, the actor, said her apartment in Mariupol had survived relatively unscathed, with just a few smashed windows. She heard in 2022 that other people had moved in, and has not made efforts to contact them since. “I’m not interested in who is there. Even if there was a theoretical chance I wouldn’t want to sell it. I have closed that place in my life, I have built a wall. The place is dead to me. Let them enjoy their ‘Russian World’,” she said.
