'The audience cried hearing Ukrainian songs at our show'
The 26-year-old professional actress moved in with a host family in Malton in 2022 and began working at a nursery, but found she "couldn't live" without the creative arts.
Now Ms Klymenko is the founder and director of DSpace, a Ukrainian theatre group which performed at this year's York International Shakespeare Festival.
"I was amazed at how many people were interested. The main goal is to create a safe and inspiring space for self-expression. I call it a space of inspiration," she said.
DSpace members span a wide range of ages - from primary school children to adults - and all are Ukrainians.
Ms Klymenko had previously taught drama workshops to children, and decided to launch a similar venture in York, teaching classes in her native language.
She said she was "amazed" by the uptake and by the amount of Ukrainian nationals living around her, but struggled to find a suitable venue to host the classes.
Around the same time, she was invited to take part in Working Title, a project which united actors from national theatre companies in Ukraine with UK artist
Through this, she was introduced to David Richmond, senior lecturer of drama and theatre at York St John University, who offered a free space to rehearse at the city centre campus.
Mr Richmond said: "The university has a policy of social justice and the creative arts have led on that for many years.
"We want to the support the Ukrainian community's creativity and expression and feeling of security and belonging.
"Dara is doing such good work in her community and in theatre so it seemed [providing space was] the ideal thing we could do to help, the ideal thing they need which is space and time to tell their stories in the way they want to tell them."
The group rehearses for three hours each Monday evening and members travel from York, Selby and the surrounding area to attend.
While some members are beginners, others have previous acting experience, often from their life in Ukraine before the war.
Sergi, 25, had completed his theatre degree at university and had started to secure some jobs before he moved to the UK.
He explained that finding a theatre company that spoke his native language was important as it helped him find common interest in shared experiences.
"Because we are all people from one country, we have the same traditions, the same culture so it's easy to communicate so I'm happy to do this with Ukrainian people," he said.
"Sometimes it's difficult because of language. Most projects are looking for native speakers. But the York Shakespeare Festival was a new experience for me in theatre, and I was happy in the same way to act with Ukrainian and English people, and it was easy to connect."
The play DSpace performed at the festival was called There's No Clock in The Forest, an original blend of Shakespeare texts and the Ukrainian play Mavka (the Forest Song).
"For us it was a huge success – we had lots of audience members, from Ukraine and also from England as well," Ms Klymenko explained.
"Some people from the audience told me they started crying during the performance. Not because of the show but because they heard Ukrainian language, Ukrainian songs and it was so sensitive for them."
The theatre group will be tackling another deeply personal project next - a new play, partially inspired by the Hollywood film La La Land, written by Ms Klymenko herself.
Her hope is that the theme can resonate, particularly with Ukrainian people, "to never give up" on their dreams.
"It was very important to me when I created [DSpace] that it was a safe space – it's about mental health as well, a place to express your feelings," she added.
"I realised I've got to keep doing this, because I need it, my team need it and the audience needs it."
Listen to highlights from North Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North.
York St John University
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
San Francisco Chronicle
3 days ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Tomorrowland music festival opens after its main stage was destroyed by a huge fire
BOOM, Belgium (AP) — Fans roared in excitement and organizers sighed with relief as the Tomorrowland music festival kicked off Friday — just two days after a massive fire engulfed the main stage and threw one of Europe's biggest summer concert events into doubt. Workers labored around the clock to clear out the debris from the elaborate backdrop that was consumed in Wednesday's fire. Shouting ''We made it!'', the festival's opening performers, Australian electronic music group Nervo, were able to take to the main stage Friday after a last-minute scramble and slight delay. Some charred frames were still visible behind them. No one was hurt in the fire, organizers said. The causes are being investigated. Hundreds of thousands of people from around the world attend Tomorrowland's annual multi-day festival outside the Belgian town of Boom. Some 38,000 people were camping at the festival site Friday, Tomorrowland spokesperson Debby Wilmsen said. ''Maybe there are some few people that say, OK, we would like to have a refund, but it's only like a very small percentage because most of them are still coming to the festival,' she told AP. 'It is all about unity, and I think with a good vibe and a positive energy that our festival-goers give to each other and the music we offer, I think they will still have a good time,″ she said. ''We really tried our best.″ Australian fans Zak Hiscock and Brooke Antoniou — who traveled half the world to see the famed festival as part of a summer holiday in Europe — described hearing about the fire. Ukrainian visitor Oleksandr Beshkynskyi shared their joy that the festival went ahead as planned. ''It's not just about the one DJ or two DJs you're looking to see, but about all the mood and about the dream being alive," Beshkynskyi said. ___ Angela Charlton in Paris contributed.
New York Post
3 days ago
- New York Post
Trump's Health: President Diagnosed with Chronic Condition
President Trump is diagnosed with a benign but chronic condition, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says the U.S. is buying battle-tested drones from his country, and caught by Coldplay - a tech CEO's affair with the company's HR director is revealed on the Jumbotron at a Coldplay concert.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
'Do We Pivot and Do an Anthology?' ‘THR Presents' Q&A With ‘Good American Family' Star Ellen Pompeo
Ellen Pompeo is taken aback by the reception to Good American Family. The Hulu limited series inspired by the true, viral story of Natalia Grace — the Ukrainian-born girl with severe dwarfism (played by Imogen Faith Reed) who was adopted as a child by the character Pompeo plays, Kristine Barnett, and her husband Michael (played by Mark Duplass) in 2010 and later accused by them of faking her age — has become a ratings hit for the streamer (the April 30 final episode was the biggest finale of 2025 across Hulu and Disney), a water-cooler series and an Emmys contender. Pompeo stepped back from her beloved role on Grey's Anatomy after nearly two decades to pursue a project that she could disappear into when playing a role starkly different than her fan-favorite groundbreaking doctor. 'If my first thing after Grey's was a total dump, it would have been pretty embarrassing. (Laughs.) But listen, it happens. It's really hard to make a show. It's really hard to make content,' says Pompeo in the video chat (above) for THR Presents' series. 'This show is not perfect. If we had a drink over dinner, I'd tell you a million things that went wrong with it and shots I didn't like. It's hard to make a streaming show … [with the] same pace and schedule as a network show, but yet it's meant to be much slower and more creative. You just don't ever know in this business what you're going to get, what the end result will be, how people will receive it. You can think it's great. The timing might be off. You don't know what's going on in the world. So anytime you have something remotely successful in what we do is just a huge blessing and a win, and I was just so relieved.' More from The Hollywood Reporter Jonathan Bailey Is Breaking Hollywood's Rules - and Winning "It Was a Very Easy Yes for Me": 'THR Presents' Q&A With 'The Day of the Jackal' Star Eddie Redmayne Glen Powell to Star in Firefighter Movie From Director Ron Howard at Amazon MGM Pompeo says she thinks even Hulu was surprised with the viewership, which she credits to the fans of her and her co-stars, who include Duplass and Reed along with Christina Hendricks, Sarayu Blue and Dulé Hill. 'I think they expected it to do well, I don't think they expected it to do as well as it did,' she says with a laugh. 'Just because people love me as Meredith Grey and love me on Grey's, that doesn't guarantee anything moving forward. That doesn't guarantee that they'll follow me, doesn't guarantee that they'll like me or believe me in any other character as anything else. And the fact that I was shown so much support is pretty meaningful.' The series flipped its perspective midway through the eight episodes in order to deliver justice to Grace's story. After exploring allegations taken from court proceedings and public reports to dramatize multiple conflicting points of view, the series ends by clarifying that Natalia was a 7-year-old child when the Barnetts adopted her, meaning she was 8 years old when they set her up to live on her own. Despite the series not letting Kristine or Michael off the hook, the pair never faced legal repercussions after they were charged with neglect of a dependent. Michael was found not guilty in 2022. The following year, the charges against Kristine were dismissed. Pompeo feels that Good American Family has completely told Kristine's story, but with the success of the series, Pompeo says conversations between her and creator/co-showrunner Katie Robbins with Hulu around how they could continue began right after the finale. 'Those conversations started happening weeks ago,' she says. 'A couple days after episode eight dropped. I couldn't actually believe how fast it happened. There are two ideas right now. Yes, Kristine Barnett's story is over, or my version of Kristine Barnett's story is over, and I think what we are trying to decipher is: Is there a good enough reason to continue on with this story, or do we pivot and do an anthology and do another story next season? And I'm not going to tell you the story that we're thinking about, but it's awesome. That's what I really want to do. I want to do an anthology because I think the story we have lined up is so good for specifically the way we do this show and switch perspectives.' Pompeo says they have a few more meetings to decide the show's future, 'and ultimately it's up to Hulu who pays the bills.' She says she wouldn't play the lead in the new idea — 'I don't think I'm right for that character' — and would remain a producer. Pompeo produced Good American Family via her ABC Signature-based production company, Calamity Jane. She says that she and Robbins have a second idea they sold and are developing to Hulu as well. After successfully now playing a villain — which was a risk for the beloved Grey's star — Pompeo is excited to see what the future holds, whether that's producing or returning on camera, and the latter will include another seven episodes on next season's Grey's Anatomy where she's also an executive producer. Pompeo says the mega-hit ABC medical drama typically schedules her to appear in the beginning, middle and the end of the season so she's never off-screen for too long, as she continues to narrate each episode. As she continues to pivot beyond the famed hospital walls of Grey's, Pompeo imagines what an Emmy nomination and recognition from her peers would mean at this stage in her career. 'On Grey's, you really only get an opportunity to be nominated for things in your first few seasons, and so that time had clearly passed. I didn't crave that kind of recognition. I craved the sort of financial and job security situation more that I did critical accolades — that's why I stayed on the show,' she candidly explains. 'Had I been [chasing] critical acclaim, I wouldn't have stayed on Grey's for so long. So it wasn't always the most important thing to me but now that I'm doing something new, it would definitely, probably help me in this next chapter of my story — moving on from Grey's, doing other roles.' She continues, 'I haven't given anybody a reason to believe that I could do anything else, so if people did recognize that I did do something else and it was worthy of even just a[n Emmy] nomination, maybe I can give myself a compliment, because I'm not so good at that! After 500 episodes of TV, I think it's OK to want a little trophy now.' This edition of THR Presents is sponsored by Hulu. Best of The Hollywood Reporter 'The Studio': 30 Famous Faces Who Play (a Version of) Themselves in the Hollywood-Based Series 22 of the Most Shocking Character Deaths in Television History A 'Star Wars' Timeline: All the Movies and TV Shows in the Franchise Solve the daily Crossword
