Ukrainian children bring their play from bomb shelter to New York

NEW YORK • In a converted Sunday school space in Brooklyn, eight children who recently arrived from Ukraine gathered on a pair of risers and broke into song.

Hanna Oneshchak, 12, on the accordion, accompanied the other seven as they sang a Ukrainian folk song, "Ta nema toho Mykyty", about a man who decides to leave the country to seek work but then looks to the mountains and, struck by their beauty, changes his mind.

"Whatever the grief we have," they sang in Ukrainian, "I won't go to the American land."

The children, students at the School of Open-Minded Kids Studio Theatre in Lviv, were rehearsing the song last Monday, before two weekend performances of the play Mama Po Skaipu (Mom On Skype) at the Irondale Centre in Brooklyn, New York.

This will be the US premiere of the 80-minute show.

"We share our emotions with Americans," Anastasiia Mysiuha, 14, said in English, adding that she hopes the audience members will "better understand what's happening in Ukraine".

The show, to be performed in Ukrainian with English subtitles, is a series of seven monologues about family separation told from the perspective of children.

Mom On Skype was first staged in a warehouse-turned-bomb shelter in Lviv, western Ukraine, in April, just two months after the Russian invasion began. It was directed by arts teacher turned soldier Oleg Oneshchak, the father of two of the children in the play: Hanna and Oleksii, seven.

The idea for the visit came when Mr Jim Niesen, artistic director of the Irondale Centre, saw a photo essay in late April about the performance.

He said: "There was this horrific war going on, and here they were, doing a play."

He and the theatre's executive director Terry Greiss tracked down Mr Oneshchak on Facebook and, soon after, Mr Greiss and the Irondale team began raising money for travel and accommodation costs.

The bill for the month-long stay for the children and their three chaperones, which will also take them to Connecticut and Massachusetts, is around US$40,000 (S$54,800), said Mr Oneshcak.

Valeriia Khozhempa, 12, said she was struck by one thing in the US: the absence of air-raid sirens. "It's a really beautiful life. In Ukraine, there are so many air alarms."

All proceeds from the shows will go towards a fighter jet that the group hopes to help purchase for the Ukrainian military. A used jet costs about US$1 million, Mr Oneshchak said.

NYTIMES