‘Masha in Translation’ by Roxana Paun Trifan

This performance tests the boundaries of intercultural theatre expression, confronting the audiences with challenging concepts as displacement, exile and identity through a case study: the iconic character of Masha in Chekhov's ‘Three Sisters’. The narrative is focused on the sense of dislocation and displacement experienced by actors when performing in a foreign language and from a text that is itself a translation.

The show incorporates several cultural influences of the artists involved: Romanian, Australian, British, Russian, Italian, New Zealander etc. Its core is the exploration of the processes of a transmigrant actor that engages in theatre as a means to reflect on her border-crossing experiences. The mutual creation and negotiation of meaning as a social, interactive process in theatre is my answer to overcoming cultural barriers. The actor merges together multiple levels of theatre practice that conveys theatre translation holistically, as an act of intercultural communication.

'Masha in Translation' is an example of intercultural communication across time, languages and borders. This is in many ways a story of many journeys, using much more than words to connect the past and the present, to break the ‘silence’ and sometimes to correct misunderstandings.