New Plays from Finland
Milja Sarkola
Milja Sarkola (born 1975) is a Finnish-Swedish director and playwright who graduated from the directing course at the Helsinki Theatre Academy in 2006. Since then, she has directed pieces for a number of theatres in Finland, such as Theatre Viirus, Q-Theatre, and Theatre Takomo (which she was also the artistic director of between 2008-2012). The themes dealt with in Sarkola’s works include sexuality, parenthood, publicity, privacy, and narcissism.
Her approach to directing stems from the linguistic and dialectic possibilities that the texts offer as well as from the desire to represent observations and experiences through language in a fresh and compelling way. With her pieces she sets out to explore both the self and the environment from up close as well as from a distance in order to better understand the human experience as a phenomenon.
Sarkola’s auto-fictive 2012 play, The Family Member (Perheenjäsen), deals with a family in the theatre industry who prioritize work over each other. It received the 2012 Thalia Award, which is an award that is granted to theatre texts and pieces that raise socio-political issues and draw in new audiences. Her most recent play, My Capital, (Pääomani, 2020), portrays the shame associated with privilege and the ways in which money can take possession of our lives and relationships.