He Goes on Stage When He Runs Out of Words
Svetlomir is waiting for me in front of The Drama Theater in Blagoevgrad. I know that he is a 24-year-old actor, but he stands out from the countless others I have seen on the silver screen. Most of them, I imagine dressed in fancy clothes, radiating pride and self-esteem. Svetlomir, however, challenges my assumptions with his modest attire — a simple combination of jeans, a t-shirt, and a backpack. As I approach him, his strikingly expressive facial features become apparent: a beard framing his visibly slim cheekbones, and light blue, vivid eyes. Svetlomir greets me and walks me into the theater. He wanted us to meet nowhere else but the theater.
We enter the theater and immediately go backstage. It is dark and it smells like something between wood, paint, and an old building. The ground creaks while I walk. I notice that there are people on the stage. “They are building the set for the latest theatrical production of The Drama Theatre in Blagoevgrad,” he says. Svetlomir shows me the stage, and the hall and introduces me to the people. He talks slowly but moves fast, I feel like he is in his safe space.
He is, indeed.
“Back when I was in fourth grade, one of my teachers noticed that I was different than the other kids. And she pulled me aside and gave me three poems to learn and go on stage. I always wanted to show up, to sing, to dance, to act. I took anything she gave me. And she saw something in me,” Svetlomir says.
He took the lead in his first play while still a student in his hometown Tryavna. After the premiere, relatives, acquaintances, and friends were waiting outside the theater to greet him. Svetlomir felt like he has done something important. And he wanted to become an actor. Later, he decided to enroll in one of the few schools in Bulgaria where art is taught, at Tryavna, to study icon painting. There, he realized that he is also good at drawing. Art has always been a part of him. And that’s why he decided to become an actor. In 2021, Svetlomir graduated with a degree in acting from Southwestern University. He has performed in more than ten plays and has appeared on stage hundreds of times.
In The Drama Theatre in Blagoevgrad, however, Svetlomir works as an organizer. He sells tickets and promotes theatrical productions in various schools and institutions around town.
He walks me into his office. It is unlike any other, the walls are covered with drawings, flyers, and sticky notes. He made the plain, boring office with two desks facing each other and two chairs look like an exhibition. “But why an organizer,” I ask him, “You are an actor”.
“Because I am working as an actor at Novemo,” he says.
Novemo is a traveling dance-theatre troupe that was created in 2021 by Nikola Kostadinov. All nine of the troupe’s members have additional jobs to support Novemo, which self-funded all their original plays. “That is why I work as an organizer at the theater. In the future, we want to quit our third jobs and concentrate only on Novemo. I hope that we can do that at some point,” Svetlomir tells me.
“In the theatre, they tell us what we have to do. In Novemo we do what we want to do.”
“Novemo has no genre,” Svetlomir says — “Novemo is an association, an organization, a theater, people, a group. Novemo is a dream, a common dream of nine people who believe in it. There is drama, there is comedy, there are thrillers there is psychological theatre, there is movement theatre. When people watch a Novemo performance, they say it is a drama but after they have seen the performance, they say that they can recognize all known types of theatre. Some plays are more tragic and serious while others are more comedic and lighthearted,” he says.
For him, Novemo is a riot. But by no means is rebellion in the most widespread form of opposition to an idea, topic, thesis, or opinion. More of a rebellion of artists against all the people who are being oppressed for one reason or another. “Novemo was created with the idea of being free. When we want to cry, let us cry. When we want to laugh, let us laugh. When we want to create something, to have the freedom to create, to try, to be wrong, to dislike people, to like people, to explore different aspects of life. In general, we ask questions, we show situations. Everyone decides and makes their choices, personally,” he says.
In Novemo’s plays, Svetlomir combines his love for acting with his passion for dancing. Instead of dance finding him, according to Svetlomir, he discovered dance. “I have always danced. People are always dancing, even when they walk on the street and avoid a puddle. This is a movement. Dance is movement.”
“What happens to human nature when words run out?”, he asks me — “What comes after the movement is over when you can’t reach a point with your hand and fully complete the movement? What is that? When you have no words when you have no strength, you can make a minimal gesture, a minimal movement. Something short, tiny, and then everything you are talking about makes sense, right? That’s what we do at Novemo,” Svetlomir says.
I wonder what motivates him to continue pushing forward.
‘When you take a fish out of the lake and put it near the water, does that fish stop struggling to get back to the water? Never. Until it dies. It’s the same with me. I fight because I know it’s my thing. I know I’m good at it. I know what this thing brings me, I’ve tasted the satisfaction,” he says.
Svetlomir is using his psyche, his speech, his movement, his thoughts, his soul, and his feelings. I can see him in front of me and I know it. He claims that it is harder mentally than physically. Because actors employ every tool that man has, including his soul, thoughts, words, body, and intelligence.
Svetomir says that anyone can be an artist. The difference is in the barriers people put themselves.
“Аrtists don’t have barriers, and non-artists work on making those barriers stronger. If I want to somersault, I will do it. A non-artist will try three times they will be scared and won’t even step on the mat to try. And an artist will try until he doesn’t. If he must, he will sit on his neck”.
“In our business, the good and bad traits from life frequently transfer to the stage,” says Nevena, a colleague of Svetlyo and one of his best friends. “He is a great artist, in my opinion, for that reason. He is passionate. He knows that this is his thing.”
Svetlomir is an artist — an actor, a dancer, a painter, and a free human.
Margarita Arsova is a fourth-year student at the American University in Bulgaria. She enjoys getting to know new people and sharing their stories with the world.
