THE TRUTH HURTS—
AND SILENCE KILLS

Shattered Globe Theatre’s gripping political
thriller confronts the cost of telling the
truth in a world determined to suppress it

Rebecca Jordan and Tristan Odenkirk in Shattered Globe Theatre’s Midwest premiere of Vladimir

Can you imagine a country where the president and his government seem physically incapable of telling a simple truth, comfortable with broadcasting obvious lies and meaningless explanations? In the world of this play, journalists are under attack, but the bravest among them keep searching for the truth, no matter who it implicates, because the truth matters. We’re in Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin’s Russia.

Oh, did you think we were somewhere else?

Adam Schulmerich and Rebecca Jordan

The Midwest premiere of Vladimir by Erika Sheffer, directed by Lou Contey at Shattered Globe Theatre, is a historical political thriller with messages about truth and nuance that hit uncomfortably close to home.

Juliana Liscio and Rebecca Jordan

In Vladimir, Russian independent journalist Raya Bobrinskaya (Rebecca Jordan) knows that what she’s doing is dangerous, but she doesn’t care. It’s 2004, and Putin has just won a rigged election to begin his second presidential term. The Second Chechen War is underway, and Russia’s attacks on innocent Chechen people are brutal. Raya is covering the war, and her vocal opposition has put her life at risk. Raya’s daughter Galina (Juliana Liscio) would love for her mother to stop putting herself in danger so that she can live long enough to attend Galina’s upcoming wedding. Her charming boss, Kostya (Adam Schulmerich), wants to share the truth, but doesn’t have quite the stomach for danger that Raya does, and danger is precisely what bubbles under the surface at each turn.

The cast

Tristan Odenkirk and Rebecca Jordan

The design team ensures that the Kremlin’s presence, control, and danger are felt throughout. Scenic designer Joe Shermoly created movable wall panels to look like slabs of concrete, giving the flexible, modular set a cold, confined feeling. Director Contey orchestrates the scene transitions as a continuation of the story, with cast members cloaked and masked in black, pointing red-beamed flashlights at each set piece and Nga Sze Chan’s props to signal where they should be repositioned. Shelley Strasser’s red lighting takes on the role of the unseen forces of the Kremlin as a puppetmaster, adding to the suffocating hopelessness that these journalists begin to feel as they try to make people care about the truth.

Ben Perry and Adam Schulmerich

Steve Peebles and Adam Schulmerich

In her pursuit of truth, Raya is relentlessly brave and relentlessly annoying—a trait Jordan seizes on, making Raya abrasive, thus complicating our feelings about her. Heroes can be annoying even while they’re being brave. Nuance is part of the play’s message. In a moment of frustration after Chechen-led militants has bombed a school in Russia, killing over a hundred children, Raya stands before a memorial of flowers, teddy bears, and candles and says, “Us good. Them bad. No nuance. No reflection. That’s how they get us. It’s more complicated than that.” There is good and evil, but no side is perfect, and evil is still evil even if the “good guys” are doing it.

Drew Schad and Tristan Odenkirk

The memorial for the children remains onstage during the rest of the play, a constant reminder of the innocent Russian lives lost. Chovka is the flip side of that coin: the constant reminder of the Chechen lives destroyed. She is a memory of a Chechen woman who haunts Raya throughout the play, never letting her forget the way this war has stolen lives and hope. As Chovka, Kseniya Janyan delivers one of the play’s most beautiful moments: a monologue in which the character describes how she lost her heart. Her still, open performance allows Sheffer’s poetic language to fill the space in this deeply moving scene.

Kseniya Janyan and Rebecca Jordan

Shattered Globe’s production of Vladimir never lets us forget the lives impacted by power-hungry men and the people they drive to violence. It challenges us to pay attention and think about the people whom “good guys” are bombing in our world today. It’s never really that simple, and hurting other human beings is always wrong. But it’s hard to keep caring when we see violence like this on our feeds every day. What can we possibly do to stop it? Vladimir recognizes how exhausting it all is, and it also presents us with a challenge: “How human can you be? How much will you let yourself feel?”

Tristan Odenkirk and Drew Schad

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photo by Michael Brosilow

Vladimir
Shattered Globe Theatre
Theater Wit, 1229 W. Belmont Ave. in Chicago
2 hours and 10 minutes, including intermission
Thu–Sat at 7:30 (dark Oct. 31); Sun at 3; Sat at 3 (Nov. 14)
ends on November 14, 2026
for tickets ($20–$60), call 773.975.8150 or visit Shattered Globe Theatre

for more shows, visit Theater in Chicago

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