STARS IN THE MORNING SKY

by Alexander Galin, translated by Michael Glenny and Cathy Porter

Union Theatre, Southwark
13 February - 3 March 2007

Produced by the Union Theatre

Using chalk to etch their “price” onto the soles of their shoes, Russian prostitutes could attract new trade from passers-by in the streets and then quickly obliterate the evidence with a quick scuff of the shoe if the police turned up. It is just as easy though for a government to scuff those elements of society it wishes to hide, when the world is watching.

Moscow 1980. The Summer Olympic games are about to begin and the international visitors are arriving. The city’s prostitutes are rounded up and sent away until the Olympics are over.

Suddenly, a small village, 100 miles outside Moscow, is inundated with ladies of the night…

Hilarious, sad, rich in humanity and understanding, moving personal stories unfold over one night, with the coming of the Olympic flame as a patriotic backdrop.

Having only ever been performed in Russian before, Stars in The Morning Sky is a wonderful choice for the Union Theatre's new Resident Director Aoife Smyth.

"Galin uses the brutal detail of these women’s lives to smash complacent assumptions about the condition of Soviet society" - The Guardian