SneakPeek: SHADOW GAME part 1

Sneak Peek*: SHADOW GAME part 1

* previously: WatchApp

SKaGeN surprises with Sneak Peek: Shadow Game: the very first real-time documentary where you can follow live for 2 x 3 weeks the messenger conversation between a documentary maker and a very young SK (Sanjid Kahn) who is looking for his way from Afghanistan to Europe.

For this production, the theatre creators of SKaGeN got to work with the thousands of chat messages, videos and audio files that Dutch documentarians Eefje Blankevoort, Els Van Driel & SK sent to each other between 2019 and 2022. SKaGeN selected and edited 2 crucial moments of 3 weeks each. It gives the audience a unique insight into the daily life of a 16-year-old boy, who tries to survive alone on the Balkan route.

In the first part, we meet SK as he plans his GAME to cross the border into Croatia. He has been touring Bosnia for over a year at this point and this MATCH should be his 30th attempt. We follow SK through the forests, along the railway lines and along the rivers that should lead him to Italy via Sarajevo. It will be a journey full of trials and disappointments, but also one of heartwarming intimacy and growing commitment: the young SK meticulously documents what he sees and experiences. One day he will show the world what is really happening at Europe's borders.

SKaGeN now offers him this scene in a triptych: Sneak Peek: Shadow Game Bosnia, Sneak Peek: Shadow Game Romania and a live performance: The Gambling Game.

The live performance The Gambling Game should be the last piece of this intense journey through Europe. On the real stage, facts and fiction meet, current events reflect European history and the documentary material mixes with the literature of Franz Kafka and Berthold Brecht. Additionally, SK and the cast of SKaGeN are performing together for the first time.

In The Gambling Game, newly arrived Sanjid tries his luck and buys a scratch ticket from the National Lottery. He wins an income for life. Luck turns to panic when the young asylum seeker has to fill in the forms and declare his age. According to the Afghan calendar, he is a minor, so he should not have bought the ticket. The Belgian government doubts his story and declares him of age. What to do now with his precarious status, because freedom has a price...

What is Sneak Peek?

SKaGeN & De Studio presented a unique project in 2020: the WatchApps Emmi & Leo, Thomize & Imke were able to delight around 20,000 viewers. SKaGeN had designed its own unique app for this. Via the revamped Sneak Peek app, you can secretly peek inside a Messenger group like we all have one...