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 “Mort, a play in English": since I hadn’t been to the theater in years, I was very eager to see it. When I tried to convince my friends to join me, they retorted, “it's not in Finnish, is it?” On the contrary, University theatre group Oulun Ylioppilasteatteri and the Razzlers were on stage with an English play.
Small wonder expectations were high when my friends and I entered the new Nuku's Valve to watch “Mort,” a play of two acts based on a novel by English comedy fantasy writer Terry Pratchett. Even on this last performance day, out of seven, the theater hall was filled with people of different ages. Death and Fun in Two Acts, “Mort”, was originally adapted to the stage by Stephen Briggs who already has adapted many other Terry Pratchett novels to the stage and performed in some of them. Terry Pratchett is a British fantasy and science fiction author well known for his Discworld novels where the world is a disc on top of a turtle. “Mort” takes place in Discworld focusing on the life of a quite regular boy called Mort, who was a dreamy boy until he started his apprenticeship at Death’s. Death felt a little bit tired of his job and was happy to let Mort take over occasionally. Death lives with his adopted daughter, Ysabell, and a very old wizard, Albert. When Mort takes over Death’s job for the first time, he accidentally kills the wrong person and the Princess Keli, who was supposed to die, stays alive. This messes up reality and history. And while Mort tries to change history before it actually takes place he falls in love with Ysabella.
All in all, this adventurous play was a lot of fun to watch, this mainly due to the impressive performances of the actors. Mort is played by a quite talented Juha Ahola who impresses with his very convincing, if not to say professional mimics and acting skills. An amazing make up and costume had turned Death, who added up to this impression by his precise movements and able acting, into an impressive figure.Princess Keli (Saila Kakko) and the magician Cutwell (Matti Mäkelä) do not rank behind in any way. In general the crew had spared no effort to create a great atmosphere and draw the viewers into the plot. The costumes were clearly chosen with care and attention to the detail. The only downside of the performance was that the world Terry Pratchett created in his books is difficult to explain in a two hour play. Some parts were too complex and could have used some additional explanations. “They should have English plays more often”, states Anne-Katrin Kirschnik from Germany “this was a lot of fun for not too much money!” After an enjoyable two hours and a happy ending, all of us were very pleased that we had come to see the play.
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