Theater on the Faroe Islands – Trap The Faroe Islands

Scene from the play *Elektra* at Tjóðpallur Føroya. Pending the construction of a new national theatre, the Faroe Islands’ national stage is housed in Tórshavn’s old dairy. ÓLAVUR FREDERIKSEN, 2017

The earliest plays known in the Faroe Islands are described in Jens Christian Svabos’ account of a trip to the Faroe Islands in 1781‑82. He wrote that young people in Tórshavn had performed two of Holberg’s plays, The Political Tinker and The Eleventh of June, and these performances ‘should, according to the place’s best experts, have far exceeded expectations’.

Ryberg’s trade created great activity in Tórshavn from 1767 and also made bourgeois culture flourish; acting was part of this new culture. However, the peace between the United States and England in 1783 meant that the basis of Ryberg’s trade disappeared, and with the trade, most of the bourgeois culture also disappeared, including the interest in plays.

In 1825, the Faroe Islands got the first of a series of young and welleducated chief administrative officer who worked in various ways to modernise Faroese society. In the years 1830‑37, F.F. Tillisch was Chief Administrative Officer, and during this period he painted theatrical scenery which was used for almost 50 years. The scant information we have about theatre in the 19th century gives a good picture of the development towards a more modern society, and it was the bourgeoisie in the new society that took an interest in theatre. They gathered in the theatre association ‘Det Thorshavnske Skuespillerselskab’.

With the introduction of free trade in 1856, bourgeois culture expanded, and plays became a regular part of the Tórshavn cultural scene. On the programme were mostly Danish comedies and vaudevilles written by e.g. Holberg, the married couple Heiberg, Thomas Overskou, Jens Christian Hostrup and Erik Bøgh. The actors had no permanent stage, but played at various vacant premises until 1882 when they were allowed to use the Løgting House as an auditorium.

Everything in the new bourgeois culture was in Danish, and plays, literature and from 1872 also the primary school were in Danish. The Faroese language was constantly losing ground and the backlash came in 1888. At the Christmas meeting on 26 December of the same year, it was decided to found a Faroese association, Føringafelagið, whose purpose was to fight for the Faroese language. The national movement was founded, and it came to shape Faroese history well into the 20th century.

From the beginning, theatre was of great importance to the national movement, and just two months after the association was founded, the first two plays in Faroese were performed in the Løgting chamber. In the coming decades, both Faroese and Danish plays were on the programme, but in around 1930 the final curtain fell on the last play performed by Faroese for Faroese in Danish.

The Sjónleikarhúsið in Tórshavn has been visited by many well-known names over the years. Here it is the lead singer of Uriah Heep, Bernie Shaw, performing together with the Faroese band Deiggj in 2010. ÓLAVUR FREDERIKSEN

The national movement was part of a major popular revival. Another part was the establishment of youth associations, temperance associations and village associations in many of the Faroese villages. In several of these associations, plays saw the light of day from around the turn of the century, and when the associations later built village halls, these often had a stage and good opportunities for putting on plays. Outside of the large towns, plays are still performed in these village halls.

The first actual auditorium was built in Tórshavn in 1892. It was the members of the old Havnar Klubbi who took the initiative to build an auditorium as an extension to the club, when the actors were told that they could no longer use the Løgting chamber. The auditorium was the centre for the town’s actors for 30 years, but it also accommodated the music association, dancing, political meetings and public talks. The auditorium provided good opportunities for visiting actors, and in 1893, Emil Wulff was on stage. The theatrical company, Boesen’s Teaterselskab, also made a big impression on the people of Tórshavn when they visited the theatre in the years 1911‑1913. In 1906, the auditorium was used as a cinema for the first time, and in the early 1920s the actors became homeless, as the auditorium was now to be used exclusively as a cinema.

In 1917, people interested in acting in Tórshavn had founded the association Havnar Sjónleikarfelag, and the major task of this association was to build a new theatre. When the theatre, Sjónleikarhúsið, was completed in 1926, a new young generation, including the well-known poets William Heinesen and Hans Andrias Djurhuus, was ready to take advantage of the opportunities offered by the new theatre.

Sjónleikarhúsið was the town’s most important cultural centre for many years, but when the British occupied the Faroe Islands in April 1940, they also commandeered the theatre. When the association got its house back after the war, time had come to set new and higher goals for theatre art in the town. In 1948, the association’s scenographer, Jacob Zahle, was sent on a study trip to Copenhagen, and it was decided to put on bigger and more demanding plays than they had done before.

In 1950, directors were used on the productions for the first time, and five years later, Icelandic Erna Sigurlifsdóttir directed the production of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. It was the first time that a professional actor was involved in the performance of a play in the Faroe Islands. Eyðun Johannessen, who performed in Of Mice and Men, travelled to Denmark to study and returned home in 1960 as the first professional actor in the Faroe Islands. He was employed at Sjónleikarhúsið, ambitions grew, and an old dream of converting Sjónleikarhúsið into a national theatre became relevant again.

For a number of years, the members of the acting association were in disagreement; some wanted to professionalise the theatre, while others wanted to continue on an amateur basis. In 1977, Gríma emerged as the country’s first professional theatre group, while Havnar Sjónleikarfelag continued as an amateur theatre and in 1979 helped found a central association for amateur theatre, MáF.

Today, MáF has eight member associations. Half of them are old youth, temperance or village associations, while the rest are actual acting associations. These are Havnar Sjónleikarfelag, Klaksvíkar Sjónleikarafelag, Suðuroyar Sjónleikarfelag, Dramaverkstaðið v. Hjørdis Johansen, Ungmannafelagið Royndin in Nólsoy, Ungmannafelagið Virkið in Sandur, Losjan Glotti í Gøtu and Bygdarfelagið Eydnan in Oyrarbakki.

The theatre group Gríma staged performances throughout the country but had no permanent theatre. However, this changed in 1998, when the town council of Tórshavn decided to convert the old dairy in the heart of the town into a theatre. The Løgting supported Gríma’s activities from the beginning, and in 2003, the Løgting decided to found Tjóðpallur Føroya. Tjóðpallur Føroya took over Gríma’s activities in 2005 and continued as the national theatre at the dairy. Since its founding, several plays have been staged every year with large numbers of visitors at the national theatre.

However, the framework for a national theatre was not satisfactory at the old dairy. In 2020, the ministry therefore decided to launch an architectural competition for the right location and shape of the future national theatre.

Further reading