The WORLD THEATRE DAY was created in 1961 by the International Theatre Institute (ITI). It is celebrated annually on the 27th March by ITI Centres and the international theatre community. Various national and international theatre events are organized to mark this occasion. One of the most important of these is the circulation of the World Theatre Day International Message through which at the invitation of ITI, a figure of world stature shares his or her reflections on the theme of Theatre and a Culture of Peace. The first World Theatre Day International Message was written by Jean Cocteau (France) in 1962.

I reported on it last year.

Yesterday, Friday 26 March, I was at the last performance of the Lefkoşa Belediye Tiyatrosu’s play ÖLÜ KENTIN NABZI. The house was full. In the row behind us was the director of the State Theatre of Nicosia South, and I assume it was his wife who at the end was presenting red roses to every member of the cast. It was a lovely gesture I found on the eve of such a day.

A play written by Orhan Asena and directed by Yaşar Ersoy, a play about the revolution in Chile – Allende and Pinochet – they made their appearance in black and white on screen -  and its impact on people, how it turns around peoples mind to the other extreme. Unfortunately I could not follow the text in all details, I just had won a general idea. It was a great job the actors did memorizing the tremendous amount of text. What an intensive piece of play, what excellent acting, intensified by the very effective stage décor which made the stage choreography very dynamic and finally by means of the exciting beat of drums, xylophone? and violin - the beat literally hit your nerves - which heightened the effect of the words spoken and augmented the tension in the house.

It is always a deep pleasure for me to see good acting, and for this play I counted 16 cast members, all terrific actors and one as good as the other and I had the pleasure to see the director of the play, Yaşar Ersoy, on stage playing an excellent Don Sebastian Desteban.

The programme was included in a brochure, a retrospective on 30 years of the Lefkosa Belediye Theatre written by Yasar Ersoy.