The fate of the theater director, who looks for talent in thousands of orphans in our country and in Africa, is told in the film “Mother”. Actress Daria Simeonova enters her image
To be the mother of not one child, but of thousands. This is the choice of theater director Elena Panaitova, who became the prototype of the main character in the Bulgarian film “Mother”. The film was the first Oscar submission for a foreign film, but was dropped because of the English lines in it, which turned out to be more than required. It was replaced by “In the heart of the machine” by Martin Makariev.
“My life is a little different from what is in the movie,” says Elena about “Mother”. Because the film has a limited budget, and it has to work with the means of the cinema to create a “personalized, more dramatic story that people can identify with.” “Mother” is a mix of facts from my life, from the things that happen in Zornitsa Sofia itself (director of the film – BA), when he went to research in Africa, and research that Daria Simeonova did (in the main role – b.a.) on the behavior of women who cannot have children”, explains Panayotova.
The program where Elena goes to the Broadbow and then to Africa to teach children really exists. “Artists for Children” was born in 2002 in Shiroka Laka, and from 2012 to 2016 it went all the way to Africa. “The fact that over 5,000 children from two continents, over 300 artists from four continents are involved, that’s true,” she added. It is also true that Panayiotova was married to a foreigner. At that time he lived between several countries and often traveled between the Netherlands and Bulgaria, teaching at the University of the Arts in Utrecht, where he participated in the Theater and Education program. It is she who gives her the opportunity to work with her students from the Netherlands and Bulgaria, as well as with other Bulgarian artists, and gradually develop her multicultural project.
“As far as the facts are the same – yes, at an early age it became clear that I could not have children,” adds Elena. But unlike her heroine in the film, whose role is played by actress Daria Simeonova, Panayotova does not find it so difficult to accept her fate. “I have not tried to do something that is against nature and that nature says cannot be done,” she explains.
Creative energy is what drives Elena all the time in her role as a young director and as a creative person in general. Falling into the Broadbow by accident, she does not find the children, but they find her. In 2002, he went to the Rhodope village to do an artistic project, but he did not know that there was also a home for children there. Starting the work process, a little later Elena and her team meet with a sponsor ready to finance the project. This marks the beginning of the 15-year program. “I have always thought that children without parents should have the chance to discover their talent, to be able to discover their passion for life, to find another center within themselves that moves them. Regardless of the dramas in life, when a person connects with his talent, he somehow connects with what he came for, and this helps him harmonize faster. And this has always been the philosophy of this program,” says Elena.
And while the film was shot in Nairobi in the Kibera ghetto, which is one of the largest in Africa, in reality life took the director to the third largest city in Kenya – Kisumu, located on Lake Victoria. However, due to the lack of a sufficient budget and weather conditions, the production had to be filmed elsewhere.
Under the “Artists for Children” program, Elena does not work alone, but with a team of artists – mostly Bulgarians. She meets with them several times a year, and in the meantime trains local people to work with the children as well. A new sponsor appears on the horizon, who decides to offer Elena to export this “know-how” to Kenya, after seeing what she manages to do with the children in Bulgaria. However, it is clear that everything is for a certain time.
After winning funding from UNESCO, Panayiotova was able to extend her activities. “The more important thing in these projects is that you see how you inspire, leave a mark, plant a seed. I saw some children who were sadder, but blossomed, mostly in Kenya, but also in Bulgaria. After our projects, they grew up and started smiling,” she explains. Later, the directors of the orphanages Panayiotova worked with told her that the children were opening dance and poetry clubs. They write their own music and develop leadership qualities. “The effects of our work that we have heard of have been so wonderful and amazing that it is rather encouraging and inspiring than saddening.”
Over the years, the director developed “Artists for Children”, initially an independent organization financed without private sponsors. And after the experience and what they learned there, many of the artists who participated then continue to work with children – they do theater at school, organize vacations at the museum or make camps that involve children in art. However, these days the program is no longer active.
“When we were working, this was a very sore problem and there were an awful lot of homes, especially in the region of Shiroka Laka and Bulgaria. Gradually, according to European requirements, they began to be closed and redirected, and centers were created. The children stopped being gathered in one place”, explains Panayotova. And this “moved the program itself”. The idea continues to develop, but it is now aimed at children who are not disadvantaged or without families. We work both with them and their parents. “We had the chance and the blessing of fate to develop this method in Bulgaria and in Kenya, because the work with orphaned and disadvantaged children was financed. This is a program that can be implemented in schools and other groups as well.”
This is not the first time that Elena and the director of “Mother” Zornitsa Sofia have met. The two have known each other for many years. Even before Zornitsa became a director. She filmed the documentary “Modus Vivendi”, in which different characters have a certain dream, turn it into a vision and change their lives. At that moment, Elena begins her project in Shiroka Luka, and her story inspires the director. Thus, Panayiotova becomes one of the characters in the documentary. “She was very impressed by the effect it had on the children.
He saw what we were doing, even though it was the beginning of the project, and he was very inspired”, says Elena.
Over the years, Zornitsa Sofia herself repeatedly expressed her desire to be part of Panayotova’s cause and to work directly with the children. Later, when Elena meets another sponsor, they do a program for teenagers who also grew up in homes. But this time they are dealing with film labs. Yet Zornitsa does not get the chance to join the cause because she is hindered by her own projects. “In 2017, I told her: ‘Zo, the program is over,'” explains Elena. Zornitsa’s strong desire to connect with children and feel what it’s like to work with them leads to the creation of “Mother”.
Filming lasted about 20 days, 8 of which were in Kenya. During half of the shooting days, Elena accompanied the film crew both in Broadbow and in Africa. Initially, the idea of Zornitsa and the screenwriter of the film, Miglena Dimova, was for it to be a documentary. But as Elena tells them details of her life, they decide that it would actually be better if Mother was directed as a feature film. “We said to ourselves, ‘Let this be inspired by a lot of facts from my life,’ but they felt free to make their own script and integrate things into it, some of which are fiction, and some of which are characters that Zornitsa meets.” Meanwhile, Elena is always by their side and supports them. And for certain scenes, the team uses very real props. The masks and costumes that the children wear, as well as the displayed dolls, are things from the project that the “Artists for Children” team has used over the years.
When Elena arrived in Kenya for the first time, the sponsor who invited her to take her program and the whole project there actually worked with organizations dealing with “severe cases of children”. Then she is confronted not only with poverty and misery, but also with the terrifying beliefs of the locals – one can be cured of AIDS if one has sexual contact with a baby or a child up to three years old.
Stepping on African soil, the theater director finds herself in the largest malaria area in Kenya, where there are the most AIDS patients and the most dead parents. “When I arrived in this area, there were about 120,000 orphaned children. I visited over 20 homes. It was very hard. Leaving, I wasn’t sure how I could help and what I could do, until later the idea was born that the best thing is to train young artists to use our method and work with the children in their community”, adds Elena .
As for whether she finds support from her relatives when she decides to go to Africa, Panayiotova answers like this: “In some sense they supported me, but not in another”. At that time, the relationship with her partner was already falling apart. And while there is a happy ending in the movie, it doesn’t happen like that in reality. It became more and more difficult because I had to travel. In these years we have organized at least 40 festivals. I’ve had 5 festivals a year on two continents. At one point, my whole life started to become a journey”, says the director. In addition, the program required a certain kind of sacrifice and dedication and less and less time for personal life. You let some things go, and you have to make choices about what you will devote your energy to, adds Elena.
After returning to Bulgaria again, Panayotova taught at the New Bulgarian University (NBU) for many years, but is currently on hiatus. However, she does a lot of shows, she even recently had the premiere of “A Play for Two” in Theater 199. In February, her hit show “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, which Elena staged a year ago in Stara Zagora, will be a guest on another theater stage, this time in Sofia. And a young troupe from Targovishte arrives in the capital to perform “Seven Steps of Love”. She is also going on tour with the show “Shakhname: Tale of the Hall”. In addition, the director has a traveling photo exhibition dedicated to the “Artists for Children” program together with her colleague Atanas Kanev. It was recently closed in Blagoevgrad, but it will still be shown in Varna, Burgas, Troyan and Ruse. “I very much hope that thanks to the film I will also be able to complete everything I owe to this cause, so that it can be passed on in the form of a book, a documentary film, exhibitions, so that this experience can be share and inspire,” she says.
But another project is knocking on her door. She is about to publish a book in which she describes the 15 years of work during “Artists for Children”. The aim is to pass on what has been learned and it will benefit those who want to practice professionally or volunteer in similar projects and engage through art with children and young people.
“Otherwise, I continue to do what I have done with the children – to tell stories, fairy tales, plays from different cultures, so that I can inspire people in Bulgaria”, Elena Panayotova sketches her life.
