By: Lamija Milišić

On the fourth day of the 62^nd edition of the International Theater Festival MESS, the audience at the Sarajevo National Theater had the opportunity to see “The Republic of Baklava”. This was the first time that this play was performed abroad. The director Anestis Azas made an appearance at the 59^th MESS as co-director of the play “Clean City” that tackled a similar topic of crossing or relativizing state/national borders and the implications of this act when putting value on an individual. 

At the beginning of the play, we are greeted by the director who introduces us to the cast and the topic of the play – this is not something that we have not seen before but it is very effective and in line with the announced pseudo-documentary nature of the play. What follows is a story about the Greek-Turkish couple who, due to the difficulties they faced in the city of Missolonghi, founded their own island state, the Republic of Baklava. This should, then, be a story about a Utopian state that bites its own tail, a story equally tragic and comic as it reflects on the idea of maintaining a neutral and apolitical state. Missolonghi was chosen to be the birth place of this idea of a new state because of the historical significance of this city which was the first to join the Greek struggle for independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821. As the play progresses, the references to this war become more evident, clearly articulating the idea of the Republic of Baklava as a story about the historical relations between Greece and Turkey.

The play opts to deliver the story about the founders of the Republic of Baklava in a comic tone, which gives a certain surreal touch to the entire plot, making the above-mentioned naiveté close to the audience’s heart (i.e. making it at all convincing). Two scenes were chosen to depict the public perceptions of the inadvertent and political significance of the marriage between a Turk, Fatih and a Greek woman, Sophia. The first take place before and the second after the founding of the Republic and both take place in different TV shows. Those two scenes consistently portray the superficiality consequential to social categories upon which the collective system of values is based. Interwoven with the sensationalist nature of a talk show, the performances of actors in those two scenes are indeed humorous albeit at times grotesque to the extent which causes the humor to fade. Perhaps this effect was intended, but at the same time, it silences the comedy and disables the audience in their attempt to identify with the characters’ tragic fate.

The audience is thereby put in an unenviable position in which, in the scenes that follow, the Greek-Turkish couple is observed through the prism of a one-dimensional success story about the pastry shop they opened. The comedy is first and foremost reflected in the ZOOM call and TEDx motivational speech scenes, whose lines are essentially comic but they are also bordering with cliché. However, the curiosity about the fate of the Republic of Baklava keeps us alert. As the play progresses, the latently eerie and somewhat sectarian undertones of Utopia take a clearer form.

Being a child of a “mixed” marriage, Fatih’s and Sophia’s son is what triggered the decision to found a new country, a safe place from bullying and discrimination. The scenes that depict the attitudes of school teachers, representatives of the parents’ council and other related stakeholders from this milieu have effectively been compressed into a simulation of an e-mail correspondence, whilst the pretenses and principles which the school observes to “protect” the children have been laid out in a stereotypical manner; however, they served as a sound foundation for further development of the characters. Such scenes can also serve as a good representation of the somewhat unresolved dilemma of “The Republic of Baklava” – is this demand for Utopia seen as tragic or comic? We may conclude that the mere fact that this play raises such a question is a reflection of its quality.   

After the TEDx talk scene or the scene in which the actors perform a choreography of making baklava as a brief summary of life on this utopian island, the amused Sarajevo audience applauded. This just goes on to support the above-mentioned uncertainty of the play, for what may have been a sharp satire of capitalism and a clear correlation with the war for independence was on the right track to become exactly that, but due to the comedy, it remains hesitant. It turns out that those “entertaining TV show” scenes are indeed entertaining. Whose viewpoint do we seem to take then?

The violence with which the authorities end the life of the “Republic of Baklava” has been harmoniously and – bearing in mind the topic of the war for independence – zealously executed as references to it were made throughout play (from Sophia’s nightmares to the slaughter at the very end). After the son of the founders of the Republic concludes that this, wiped-from-the-face-of-the-Earth state does not suit him after all, in the final scene we bid the Republic of Baklava farewell with the song “Total Eclipse of the Heart”. However, the lyrics have been altered and baklava is mentioned wherever possible. This may in turn make us laugh but it also provokes the thought that a potentially honest and righteous, albeit somewhat utopian attempt to establish a benign state which is pitied by history, has been forcefully wiped out. “The Republic of Baklava” raises the question as to how naïve the very act of questioning national or any other borders really is and who it is that – in a mocking rhythm of Bonny Tyler’s song – makes it naïve.