4.5/5★
Georgian director Ketevan Samkharadze’s five-act political farce doesn’t shy away from exposing the country’s hardest truths.
The layout on stage starts out simple: five microphones, four actors, and questions tossed at the audience — ‘What’s your name? What do you think about your working conditions? Guess the average nurse’s salary’. At first it feels light, but then one ‘volunteer’ comes up and shares her story as a nurse at a major clinic, and the mood shifts. Suddenly it’s not just theatre — it’s Georgia’s reality, right in front of us, laid out bare with humour, anger, and raw honesty.
The text behind it all is razor sharp: ‘Don’t leave the room [...] because beyond us, there’s no Europe, no Asia — only hopelessness [...] until we can’t even afford bread, until soup becomes a lie’.
It’s bleak, yes, but it’s also a call to action: Don’t leave until you act.
Most of the stories we see are real, with tiny dramaturgic tweaks for the artistic reenactment. They come from the actors, the director, or the stories of their friends. One episode shows the sexism a young woman faces auditioning for the theatre university; another digs into labour and migration, especially the women forced to leave Georgia to care for the elderly abroad. Behind the actors, a PowerPoint plays facts that are just as striking as the performances: banks giving out loans by putting claims on whatever possessions you have — even an iron or a car — and the countries where most Georgian migrants end up.
One of the performance’s most impressive aspects is how informal and direct it feels. The director, actors, and sound engineer talk to each other throughout, like we’re watching their creative process unfold live. It breaks the wall between stage and audience, making the whole thing feel urgent and present.
And then there’s the sharp humour — like the unforgettable dig at Georgian Dream MP Tea Tsulukiani and former Prime Minister Giorgi Gakharia, where their silent exchange is turned into an orgasm-like sound climax. The interaction is adapted from a session from Georgian Dream’s anti-opposition parliamentary commission, during which Tsulukiani summoned former Georgian Dream ally Gakharia and made a direct comment that ‘now she is the one asking the questions’, followed by a hysterically awkward exchange of hums, a moment that went viral on social media. The whole audience roared in laughter, but the moment also made its point: power here often looks ridiculous when you strip it down.
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Following the show, I had the chance to interview director Samkharadze, who told me this might be ‘almost the last attempt to express people’s voices on stage’, especially following the passage of the foreign agents law and the anti-queer legislation, which includes art censorship. She highlighted that currently, the theatre is completely dependent on ticket sales — ₾35 ($12) for Do Not Leave the Room.
Samkharadze also pointed out how few women directors are represented at this year’s Tbilisi International Festival of Theatre, explaining it as the result of constant double standards women face just to get their work produced.
Finally, she highlighted that the City Theatre is entirely dependent on ticket sales
Do Not Leave the Room is more than a play — it is a reminder that theatre can be a space for truth-telling and resistance. It’s funny, biting, and painfully real. And it’s exactly the kind of performance Georgia needs right now.
Do Not Leave the Room, which premiered in 2021 but has been continuously updated, was shown recently at the 2025 Tbilisi International Festival of Theatre. It will be shown again at the City Theatre on 27 September, complete with English subtitles.
