Banned in Belarus, but the Shows Go On

MINSK, BELARUS — The tidy and anonymous room, which is entered through a fenced courtyard in a sleepy residential neighborhood of this Eastern European city, is not large. It was once a garage, just big enough to accommodate a few sedans or, in this case, the closely clustered group of about 50 that has assembled on a full-moon night in late August.

But the distances of space and time being crossed in this small room are great. It feels appropriate that the audience members have been advised to bring their passports. Never mind that this is on the off chance — as has happened to other audiences — they might be arrested by the Belarussian K.G.B., which still operates under that name in this former Soviet republic. What is being celebrated is the license to travel, if only through a defiant imagination.

The occasion is the opening night of the 11th season of the Belarus Free Theater, a troupe that has never been authorized by the national government and is thus officially not allowed to perform in its homeland, which has been a dictatorship in all but name since Aleksandr Lukashenko became its president in 1994. As usual, its three exiled founders and artistic directors — Nikolai Khalezin, Natalia Koliada and Vladimir Shcherban — are on hand to welcome theatergoers, live though not in person.