Slovenia Counts

The result is text-light, movement-heavy, music-fuelled devised piece that pushes its cast to the physical limit. The stage is a shiny black expanse, bare except for a cluster of microphones forming a kind of cage. When the beat kicks in, the performers start to move one by one to the front of the stage, walking with a fixed rhythmic gait in time to Poloni’s music, rocking backwards and forwards on their socked feet. [...] While the cast never break pace, the mood continually shifts. Sometimes they pound their chests or thrust their fists in the air like spectators at a football match supporting the home team, sometimes they become a hostile mob composed of those who would keep others out. The mood veers between jubilation and shame, a sense that sometimes it is stressful being Slovenian. Occasionally the cast form a pack, only to break apart; still, they continue to chant, more intensely: a mantra, a slogan, a battle cry: Slovenia, Slovenia, Slovenia, Slovenia. At one point Lina Akif becomes almost possessed, the word Slovenia tumbling out of her mouth in a kind of breathless word vomit. [...] In other hands this might have been an endurance exercise for the audience too, but Nübling, Poloni and the performers insert so much variety and play into the piece that it never becomes wearying, quite the opposite, it is intense, visceral, hypnotic and, at times, very fucking funny. 

Nübling’s and Poloni’s performance is primarily intense physical theatre, where body and voice serve as the main means of expression, while text takes a secondary role. It’s an energetic journey, a trance-like trip built from bodies, movement, sound, and music which creates an auditory mosaic reflecting Slovenian society. Text appears in later stages of the performance, but its full understanding is not necessary for comprehension. The choreography itself and its meaning can suffice to convey a deeper sense. Conceptually and ambiguously, Slovenia Counts presents the face of contemporary Slovenia. Music by Jackie Poloni, a key element of the performance, sets the rhythm for the actors’ movements and the tempo of the entire production, also building tension and atmosphere, which, along with the creators, immerses us, the audience, in a Slovenian trip full of diverse cultural codes. [...] The acting team for this performance excels not only in acting challenges but also in performance, and they adapt well to this type of theatre. They can work excellently both individually and as a collective theatrical body that moves and reacts together. However, individual personalities emerge from this collective body, where each one presents a different personality.