DoSEL project meeting brought theatre professionals from all over Europe to Tallinn

From February 6th to 8th, 2025, theatre professionals from Slovenia, Croatia, the Basque Country, Catalonia, Malta and the United Kingdom gathered in Tallinn, with whom the Estonian Theatre Agency is participating in the international project Drama of Smaller European Languages (DoSEL).

As the aim of the project is to promote the translation and staging of plays written in smaller European languages, the three days were spent in passionate discussions on how to compete with the big theatre countries and languages in the field of dramaturgy.

On Friday, the DoSEL team met with Kaia Fransiska Frostmann Lundenes, dramaturg of Dramatikkens Hus, the Norwegian centre for playwriting development, who shared her organisation’s best practices for supporting both emerging and experienced playwrights, and raised questions about the limitations for international distribution of plays. On Saturday, however, the DoSEL team put their heads together to find solutions to overcome these limitation, concluding, among other things, that the key to the international circulation of plays often lies in personal communication.

That is why Estonian theater-makers were also invited to get to know our guests: on Friday, we met with the directors of the Von Krahl Theater as well as Urmas Lüüs, who gave us a tour of the exhibition The Life and Death of Mr. N at Kumu Art Museum, and on Saturday, a small delegation from the Estonian Drama Theatre joined the group. Members of the Estonian Directors and Dramaturgs Union also took part in the events of the DoSEL meeting.

The Estonian Theatre Agency would like to thank all those who joined in and thought along with us!

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