Alina is a story about unconditional familial love in the face of addiction. Specifically, it is a story about a brother and sister, Emil and Alina, and the way in which Emil’s substance abuse, self-destructive tendencies and addiction creates an imprisoned life for both him and Alina. Each day is spent in eternal, fragmented chaos that does not advance in any direction, breeding further hopelessness. Yet through all this, Alina displays her devotion and tries her best to keep her brother alive as she knows he does not have the strength to do so himself.
The superficially plain yet deeply heavy play questions the extent to which we are willing to go to take care of our family and sacrifice our own well-being for others, the horrifying realities of loyalty and destruction being brought forth with intimate lucidity. Through its fragmented and episodic style, we lose all sense of time and reality and as this linearity fades, we come to better understand the inner world and psyche of what the siblings must endure. We are presented with the minuscule situations that unfold amidst uncontrollable chaos, revealing the dangerous hubris from within, revealed through silence, fragility and weakness.
The play premiered in the Finnish National Theatre’s small stage in the fall of 2019. English translation by Eva Buchwald.
The following quotes and lines of dialogue have been directly cited from the translation by Eva Buchwald. The numbers refer to the page numbers from the original text.
4:
Gravity
ALINA
It’s embarrassing when someone trips and falls. That moment. Given the chance, you’d turn away but it all happens so quickly. Face contorting, arms flailing, nothing to cling to, that cry escaping from their lips, like a deaf person shouting. No stability, no control. One minute they’re standing there or walking perfectly normally, and then all of a sudden they buckle under and collapse. Like scaffolding or a dream or a bridge collapsing. It’s embarrassing, gravity. The law of it.
And there comes a point inevitably when the movement stops, and before anyone has a chance to react or assess the damage, just for a split second, everything is very still. As if time stood still.
Emil lifts his head off the floor. His head is bleeding.
ALINA
Show me.
No don’t move, you’ll bleed on the carpet.
Show me.
It’s nothing serious. It’s just head wounds tend to bleed a lot.
It’s nothing serious.
It’s just your skin’s so soft.
________________________________________
12:
Police
The doorbell rings. A police officer is holding Emil up.
POLICE OFFICER
Evening.
ALINA
Emil.
POLICE OFFICER
He was spotted by a passer-by… Managed to get this address out of him when he came to.
ALINA
He’s my brother.
POLICE
Is there anywhere else?
ALINA
No. Not really.
POLICE
Seems it’s not the first time.
ALINA
No.
POLICE
Maybe there’s something…
ALINA
Yeah.
POLICE
…you should… somewhere you could…
ALINA
Yeah.
POLICE
Will you be all right?
ALINA
Yeah.
POLICE
Well, goodbye then.
ALINA
Yeah.
Elli Salo’s Alina is a play with few words which still manages to speak volumes about a person who loses their loved ones and almost themselves. It reveals the cruel reality of the cemented everyday chaos in a delicately touching way, enigmatically and poetically.
- The Finnish National Theatre, website, 21 Aug 2019
Is it still necessary to make plays about substance abuse, some may ask. I say yes, it is. As long as there exists this type of dependency on loved ones and only living through the help of others, it is necessary to time and time again bring forth and consider the thoughts that arise from this topic. Which is probably forever.
Putting on your own oxygen mask in a challenging situation is certainly difficult, painful, and often even impossible.
- Anja Pohjanvirta-Hietanen, ET Magazine blog, 2 Sep 2019
