Pussy Riot: Hunger Strike

A co-production with the Bush Theatre.

Beginning Monday, 23 September, I am going on hunger strike. This is an extreme method, but I am convinced that it is my only way out of my current situation.

On August 17 2012, 21-year old Nadezhda Tolokonnikova was sentenced to two years imprisonment in Penal Colony No 14 in the Mordovian village of Parts. She was convicted along with Yekaterina Samutsevich and Maria Alyokhina, fellow members of Pussy Riot. Charged with “premeditated hooliganism performed by an organized group of people motivated by religious hatred or hostility” all three pleaded not guilty. Their lawyers said that the circumstances of the case revived the Soviet-era tradition of the show trial.

In protest against the shocking ‘slavery-like’ conditions that she endures as a prisoner of Penal Colony No 14, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova has written an extraordinary letter detailing her experiences there and explains why she has taken to staging a hunger strike until the prison authorities ‘start treating us like humans’.

This event is a collaboration between the Bush Theatre and HighTide Festival Theatre and includes a performance of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova’s letter by Stacey Gregg, a theatre-maker and writer.

Pussy Riot: Hunger Strike was performed at the Bush Theatre.

Cast & Creatives