This is my first and my last bomb!

Belgrade Drama Theatre. Woman-bomb. The performance begins at 10pm. Despite the late schedule, there are more people than the audience seats. I try to get myself in by saying I have to write the critique. Eventually, everyone turned out to have entered. The stage is deconstructed. It doesn’t exist. Or, better yet, the whole space is turned into a stage. The seats are where the stage used to be. I see an actress standing in a corner. She starts whispering. The audience screams: “Speak up!” She seems to be reluctant. Then, a voice. Where is it coming from? From the audience. Then another one. I cannot locate them. I start fidgeting trying to recognize actresses in the audience. Slowly, the voices start coming from all around but the faces are nowhere to be seen. One of these sitting next to me might start talking? I feel squeamish. Tick-tick-tick… this is my first and my last bomb! And then, a soft light starts discovering the actresses. All of them are women! Unknown actresses, in fact! Actually, I recognize some of them. I have seen them on other performances. But I have never seen them on stage. Interesting. Are marketing and mainstream powerful enough to bring popularity to some yet not to the others? Even when those others are more talented? The tension rises. We get information about women kamikazes. Assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The statistics. The photo materials. Revealing the manipulation and recruitment systems. There is only 12 minutes and 36 seconds left! What do these women do in such a short time? I see disbelief on some faces in the audience. Faces of older people. Some of them are holding small flags. The actresses ask them to stand up and wave the flags while someone is saying a text. How rude! Isn’t audience someone who watches a performance? Women. Human rights. Feminism. It all comes up. It breaks out. It breaks the chains. There is air of uneasiness in the audience. And a few satisfied smiles. Why don’t they focus on woman-bomb? Is it necessary for them to demolish the whole system of our beliefs and convictions in order to describe the phenomenon? Not all the women are potential bombs. Right? Please, tell me they are not!!
Oh, no! The one next to me starts talking! I knew I was in danger! She takes out a burglar mask and puts it on her head. There is a stewardess, too. We are on a plane. No, we are in a waiting room and the stewardess is there for some peculiar reason. Will she explode, when will she explode?! She falls into my lap which, despite the softness of her hair, gives me creeps. She stays there, motionless, for a few moments. Then, she gets up, resumes talking and puts a paper plane into my hand. I throw the plane into the audience… I become an accomplice! I release some of the tension, but it all comes back to me! They start the countdown! 20, 19, 18, 17… Everything is over! Over on the other side, Ružica Sokić seems ready for the explosion! She has put on her glasses and covered her ears! Shall I follow her example? Will it help me? The countdown is over. The lights go off. There is a silent Ka-boom… Someone has already taken up the responsibility for the explosion.
We are safe after all. We leave talking about the direction, the acting, the stage. Isn’t it a good way to avoid all the unpleasant questions Ivana Sajko asks in this extraordinary performance? This seems to be just the first and the last bomb in our lethargic reality. But, how do we manage to explode more than once?

Dušan Milojević