The trainer wanted youngsters for her summer season performing class in Kyiv, which might finish with the efficiency of an authentic play.
“This can be a course for completely happy kids, free of their ideas and desires,” the trainer, Olesia Korzhenevska, wrote on Fb final spring.
It was onerous to seek out completely happy youngsters in Ukraine. The pandemic and the battle with Russia had trapped some younger folks of their houses, solitary and fearful, for greater than 4 years. Many didn’t know the best way to socialize and couldn’t think about a future with out battle.
However two days after her Fb put up, Ms. Korzhenevska heard from the mom of a 16-year-old boy, asking her to simply accept him within the class.
Sasha Suchyk was an unlikely candidate. A yr earlier, he had dropped out of the identical class and landed in a psychological hospital, affected by medical despair, even hurting himself. Buffeted by the battle and darkish ideas, he was nonetheless within the hospital, the place he had spent many of the earlier yr.
“Your classes for him can be concerning the alternative to open himself up and discover new buddies,” his mom, Olena Suchyk, advised the trainer.
Ms. Korzhenevska, 40, remembered Sasha. Skinny, with lengthy brown hair and a considerably vacant look. He had disappeared after just a few lessons. However now he despatched her a video of himself, and he or she noticed he had gained weight. His hair was quick. He smiled.
“I’ve been taking part in guitar for 4 years and performed violin for 5 years,” Sasha stated. “I need to be a part of the course to develop my artistic potential and make new buddies.”
Ms. Korzhenevska was not educated to work with troubled youngsters. However she was a affected person trainer, and he or she had discovered lots elevating her personal teenage son, who was autistic.
“That is fairly a problem,” she remembered eager about Sasha. “However I settle for it.”
Sasha obtained out of the hospital in June. For the following three months, he and three different younger actors tried to place apart their worries and work on the play Ms. Korzhenevska wrote for them. Its theme was that life may work out even when all the things appeared to be falling aside.
The title of the play was “It’s okay!” However may it’s, actually?
The Instructor
Ms. Korzhenevska had labored as an occasion planner, trainer and movie producer earlier than she began educating performing lessons to youngsters in the course of the pandemic.
A constructing in Kyiv’s hipster neighborhood of Podil was her artistic laboratory. With its brick partitions painted white, hardwood flooring and excessive ceilings, the bottom ground vaguely resembled a tech entrepreneur’s Manhattan loft. Ms. Korzhenevska named it the 9¾ College, after the magical practice platform within the Harry Potter books, and provided lessons primarily on the weekends.
After Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Ms. Korzhenevska used the area to additionally educate navy recruits to function drones and run drills. Upstairs, lecturers labored along with her son and one other autistic teenager.
Ms. Korzhenevska wrote a brand new play for each performing class. After the invasion, she targeted on battle tales as a result of many college students had family members combating close to the entrance strains. In 2023, the scholars obtained “Turtle within the Pot,” so named as a result of one teenager’s household had fled their house carrying their pet turtle in a pot.
Ms. Korzhenevska observed straight away that the vibe in 2024 was completely different. Everybody wanted a break from the battle. She wished to assist the scholars think about themselves in a extra predictable, extra routine atmosphere. Someplace like America, Ms. Korzhenevska thought, the place none of them had ever been.
She wanted a break, too. Her fiancé, Dani, whom she had met at a music competition in 2017, had joined the military the day after the Russians invaded, and he was nonetheless on the japanese entrance, flying drones.
The Play
When creating her performs, Ms. Korzhenevska seemed to the scholars for inspiration.
The 2024 class had 4 college students. Solomia Cherepushko-Zagrebelna, a 13-year-old who goes by Solya, spent hours a day on her magnificence ritual — sustaining stiletto nails and eyelashes that seemed like awnings. However at school, she was critical, the coed most within the craft of performing.
Anna Yuzhda, 14, wore glasses and appeared nerdy, however she performed the guitar and exuded cool. Ms. Korzhenevska determined they could possibly be sisters, one lovely and one brainy.
A 3rd scholar, Alisa Pazushko, was an outdated soul at age 12. Two years earlier, because the Russians besieged her house of Mariupol, her mom woke her one morning and advised her to pack. She grabbed two books — “How one can Practice Your Dragon” and a Harry Potter — however left behind her favourite stuffed animal, a gray-and-black cat, and along with her household, fled to a brand new life in Kyiv.
Alisa attended on-line lessons from Kyiv, and so had not made buddies in her new metropolis. Tall for her age, she appeared as if she may use one thing to look after, Ms. Korzhenevska thought. Alisa may play the mom within the story that was starting to take form in Ms. Korzhenevska’s head.
The tough define: A teenage boy from an prosperous New York Metropolis household was orphaned in a automotive accident and despatched to stay in rural Mississippi along with his mom’s greatest good friend, who was so poor she couldn’t even afford pancake syrup. The girl had two daughters: a wise bookworm and a phenomenal cheerleader. The boy, Simon, fell in love with each.
Sasha would play Simon.
Ms. Korzhenevska picked her setting after assembly an American in a Kyiv bar who extolled the virtues of his hometown: West Level, Miss., a metropolis of 10,000 with a website boasting that it “embodies what was greatest about America a technology in the past.”
She included two American songs. One was “Oceans (Where Feet May Fail),” by Hillsong United, a reminder to maintain religion in God, even when issues appeared troublesome. The opposite was carried out by Jane Marczewski, often known as Nightbirde, who grew to become an international sensation after singing it on “America’s Bought Expertise” when she had terminal most cancers.
That tune, “It’s OK,” gave the play its title. Ms. Korzhenevska would say later that she wrote it with Sasha in thoughts.
The Star
On a Sunday in July, a generator sat close to the entrance door of the theater in case the electrical energy went out, because it typically did when Russia attacked Ukraine’s energy provide. Air-raid sirens punctuated the hum of site visitors. It was about 90 levels.
However on the makeshift stage, it was Mississippi. Sasha, taking part in Simon, slumped into the room and flopped glumly onto a chair. Too unhappy, Ms. Korzhenevska thought. By this level within the script, Simon had been dwelling along with his new household for just a few months.
“You’re nonetheless unhappy, however just a little extra enjoyable,” Ms. Korzhenevska defined. “You’ve been right here for some time, and so that you’re just a little extra cheerful. You have been horrible as soon as, however not a lot anymore. You’ll be able to smile now.”
Sasha tried it once more, with a touch of a smile. Angst with chance, a singular teenage emotion.
The pandemic had been onerous for Sasha, who had gone to high school on-line and spent numerous time alone. As soon as the battle started, his mom and stepfather despatched him to Poland, the place he can be safer, to stay along with his father.
For nearly a yr, Sasha bounced between his dad and mom, relying on whether or not his college in Kyiv was open. Within the chaos, the disappointment that put him within the hospital took over.
The forged didn’t discuss such issues. They targeted on the venture.
Simply as Sasha had the central function within the play, he grew to become the middle of the category, with the three youthful women seeming to fawn over him. With Anna, he practiced Nirvana songs from the play on the guitar. Alisa most well-liked speaking to Sasha over anybody else.
“We’ve got extra pursuits in widespread than with the opposite women,” Alisa stated.
The scholars discovered as they went. Ms. Korzhenevska taught Sasha the best way to maintain his skateboard within the center, so it didn’t dangle awkwardly. She advised Anna, who performed the brainy sister, that she wanted at hand an apple to Sasha in a means that conveyed flirtation. The younger actors labored onerous, memorizing their strains. Sasha discovered a poem about loss and hope.
“And even when your soul is probably the most desolate of deserts, then one thing will develop from it,” he repeated.
Nonetheless, the battle intruded. Ms. Korzhenevska noticed a psychiatrist to deal with her fear about her fiancé and her nation, however the medicine made her need to sleep on a regular basis. On some days, she couldn’t get off the bed.
“The one factor managing to get me out of my home is that this play,” she stated. “For the rehearsal, I’m fantastic.”
Dani — whose full identify isn’t being printed due to navy guidelines — was in command of a gaggle of drone operators close to the japanese city of Pokrovsk. On Sept. 6, a automotive carrying two of his troopers hit a land mine. The soldier driving misplaced the decrease a part of her left leg. Dani despatched a video to Ms. Korzhenevska of the panicked journey to evacuate her, and so they cried collectively whereas watching it.
9 days later, the play would premiere.
No Regrets
Exterior the theater, greater than 40 folks, together with Sasha’s mom, waited, wearing Sunday outfits and holding bouquets. Some had not been to the theater in years.
Inside, Sasha sat on the dressing room ground in shorts and his favourite shirt, which had English phrases like “insurgent” printed on it. He chewed the within of his lip. His face, at all times expressive, settled someplace between startled and amused.
Alisa paced. Sasha and the 2 different women tried rest methods: shaking out their fingers, taking part in meditation music. Would they have the ability to keep away from laughing once they sang American songs?
Ms. Korzhenevska launched the manufacturing, sporting a blue and white polka-dot costume and along with her blond hair pulled again.
“We’re in the midst of a battle,” she advised them. “We’ve got been speaking about battle for a very long time. However this efficiency is completely different. We wished to point out one thing simple, romantic and never about battle.”
Alisa got here out first. Quickly, Sasha appeared as Simon. Ms. Suchyk, overwhelmed to see him in such a distinguished function, started to cry.
Sasha forgot a line, as did one of many women. Within the viewers, nobody knew. Because the story unfolded, Simon fell for each sisters and commenced to simply accept his dad and mom’ demise. In the long run, he moved on however left items: pancake syrup, a glowing costume designed by his mom, who had been a dressmaker, and $2,000 so the brainy lady may get Lasik eye surgical procedure.
The viewers responded as if the play had launched one thing in them that they’d been holding again. “No person died ultimately and all the things was OK,” Ms. Korzhenevska stated. “However folks have been crying.”
Alisa’s mom stated nobody ought to decide the efficiency by her household’s response, as all of them had post-traumatic stress dysfunction. Tears streamed down the face of Alisa’s aunt, whose former husband disappeared and was presumed lifeless after Russian troops took over Mariupol.
Sasha stated the category had helped him make buddies and return to high school. He now needs to turn into a psychologist, he stated, to assist navy veterans and youngsters.
He talked about his character, Simon, as if he have been actual.
“I do know Simon is fairly unhappy however with that household that loves him, the character, he obtained beloved by somebody,” Sasha stated. “It was excellent for him.”
After the efficiency, Ms. Korzhenevska joined the actors onstage and praised every one. Sasha, she stated, had developed a type of peace and interior calm.
“I’m simply on tranquilizers,” Sasha stated. The viewers laughed.
“Me too,” Ms. Korzhenevska admitted.
“I’m simply joking,” he replied.
Ms. Korzhenevska hugged him. “I’m not,” she stated.
Evelina Riabenko contributed reporting.
Audio produced by Sarah Diamond.
