They Were Actors in the Same Kharkiv Theater. Russia’s War Forced Them into Other Roles

Before the war, Yaroslav Podshyvalov, Dmytro Tretiak, Tetiana Tumasiants, and Oleh Makoveichuk shared a stage. Now, they share something else entirely. The actors of Nafta, an independent theater in Kharkiv, once told stories mostly from their own experience, personal and collective. Then Russia’s full-scale war arrived, and they stepped into the roles they didn`t plan to.

On February 24, 2022, Yaroslav Podshyvalov was supposed to premiere a new play in Kharkiv. But that morning, Russian bombs were falling across Ukraine. Instead of putting on a costume, Yaroslav put on a uniform and went to defend his country.

“I was given a weapon, a uniform, and the rank of senior soldier,” he says. “I knew the people in the unit. They didn’t expect to see me. But the Russians were already on the outskirts of Kharkiv. I had previous military experience. The path was already set for me.”

Located just 30 kilometers from the Russian border, Kharkiv came under heavy fire within hours. Theaters went dark. Like everyone else in the city, artists had to choose: wait, evacuate, volunteer, or fight.

Yaroslav chose to fight. So did at least three of his fellow actors—colleagues from Nafta, an independent theater collective in Kharkiv—who agreed to share their stories for this piece.

For seven years, Nafta Theater had carved a radical path through Ukraine’s cultural landscape—no classical plays, no hierarchy, no state funding. Every production was a collective creation. They told stories of war and colonial trauma, ecological collapse and bodily resistance, long before these themes broke through their own walls.

“We were making important work,” says Dmytro Tretiak, an actor and Yaroslav’s colleague from Nafta. “But theater, like culture in general, is a long game. Right now, I can’t afford to play the long game. I feel I need to act more directly.”

Dmytro first joined the army through Radio Khartia, a military-run media project named after the brigade itself. When we spoke, he was preparing to move into combat.

“Any day now I’ll start working as a drone operator,” he said. “I’ve submitted the paperwork and I’m waiting for it to be approved.”

That’s how it happened: from theater, he was pulled into the army, and from military media into a combat unit. “Right now, there’s no space for theater in my life,” says Dmytro.

The final decision

Dmytro didn’t plan to enlist. At the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, he and his girlfriend left Kharkiv and agreed that he would return, but only to volunteer. He joined Kulturnyi Shock, or Cultura Shock, an initiative run by Kharkiv`s artists and cultural workers to help the military. But as the war dragged on, the logic of “just a few weeks—and the war will be over” gave way to a harder truth.

“At some point, that idea just stopped working,” he says. “I had to prepare myself mentally for ten years. Better to be pleasantly surprised than constantly disappointed.”

Eventually, he decided to join the military.

“I chose Khartiia. It’s a brigade with roots in Kharkiv, and even the name carries the city. I have a strong sense of justice, and I knew I wasn’t going to give up my home,” Dmytro says.

Khartiia is one of Ukraine’s youngest brigades, but it quickly gained recognition, both for its combat performance and the diversity of people who joined its ranks. Formed in Kharkiv in the early months of the full-scale invasion, the brigade has drawn many artists, musicians, and public figures. Among them is acclaimed writer and musician Serhiy Zhadan. Together with fellow soldiers, including Dmytro, he helped launch Radio Khartia.

Among those who now serve in the brigade is Tetiana Tumasiants, another actress from Nafta, and one of Dmytro’s fellow soldiers.

When the war began, her partner, also an actor, joined the Kyiv Territorial Defense. Tetiana followed him.

“I couldn’t just sit still,” she says. “I didn’t know exactly what I could do, but I knew I couldn’t just do nothing.”

Their path took them from Kyiv to Mykolaiv to the Kherson front and back. They guarded warehouses, patrolled industrial zones, and survived missile strikes. After a year, they transferred to Khartiia together.

Khartiia, she jokes, sometimes feels like “a theater platoon,” filled with creative people and, as she puts it, “a few celebrities.”

But the stage still calls.

“I had a beautiful career,” she says. “At the puppet theater in Kharkiv, I played Gertrude in Hamlet and other main characters. Nafta, that was raw, current, alive. I loved being part of it.”

Now, back in Kharkiv, the return feels symbolic. Tetiana has already co-created several performances for military audiences with her partner, and she hopes to continue.

“I love acting. I want to come back to it.”

War and art

When Dmytro joined the army, he didn’t expect to stand out. He assumed the theater had prepared him for many things, but not for military service. And yet, by the end of his training, he noticed something surprising.

“I realized actors have great starting data for becoming soldiers,” he says. “I could react fast, control my body, project my voice. All of it came from the stage. I thought I’d be the weakest one. But I wasn’t.”

At first, his creative skills were put to use at Radio Khartia, another role he slipped into “like an unexpected mask.” Later, he led public speaking workshops for officers and sergeants, helping them refine their voice.

Now, he's preparing to shift again—into a drone operator role. 

For Yaroslav, the path went the other way. He began with a gun in his hands, an armored vehicle gunner, until an injury ended his frontline role. But that wasn’t the end of his service.

After recovering, Yaroslav was offered a place in Kulturnyi Desant, or Cultural Forces, an initiative founded by service members with creative backgrounds. Among other things, the group runs a mobile theater that brings short performances to soldiers at bases, hospitals, and rehabilitation centers.

“I hadn’t performed in years,” says Yaroslav. “But they knew I’d studied puppetry, and they asked me to join. It was a small 15-minute piece, but it meant something.”

The performance isn’t a traditional play. It’s part ritual, part parable, a compact story meant to resonate with soldiers carrying visible and hidden wounds.

“It’s not about escaping reality. It’s about offering a different lens,” Yaroslav says. “You never know how people will react. Some shut down. Some cry. Some don’t say a word. But you try to remind them that they are not alone. We support them.”

Not the same

For Yaroslav, the work is also a bridge between the world he left and the one he hopes to return to.

“This isn’t theater like before,” he says. “But it still connects people. It helped me reconnect with myself. Maybe, someday, I’ll return to the stage for real. But it won’t ever be like before. Not with the experience we’ve lived through. You re-evaluate people. You re-evaluate art itself.” 

It’s not that he’s against going back to the theater. Some days he wants to. But those thoughts don’t last long, he pushes them away.

“I know what’s happening at the front right now. I can’t allow myself to be making theater and feel okay. Not while others are still out there.”

What helps him cope is the knowledge that other artists have made similar choices.

“Take Oleh Sentsov. I saw his film Real in Kyiv,” Yaroslav says. “He’s insanely talented. Now he’s storming trenches near Zaporizhzhia. That gives me something to hold on to.”

Oleh Makoveichuk, another Nafta actor, has reached a different moment. Since 2022, he has fought on the Kharkiv front. Now, because his father is a wounded veteran, he has the legal right to be discharged. While others are still debating what the future might hold, Oleh has to decide now.

“I ask myself every day: Do I want to go back to the theater? And maybe, yeah,” he says. “Maybe I’d do a project. Just to remember what it felt like. But fully return? I don’t see it. Not yet.”

The war changed him. The country, too.

“Society sees everything differently now,” says Oleh. “And soldiers. I don’t know what I’d want to say to people, or how.”

He’s exhausted. Not just physically. “I need healing. I’ve become more closed off. This experience left a mark. My time there is done.”

When asked what he would take with him from the war, his answer came quickly. And quietly.

“My friends. If I could, I’d bring back Nazar, who was a sapper. Oleksii, he worked with drones. And Robert. And Sasha. There were many. Too many.”

And yet, something remains. Dmytro puts it into words:

“I can’t bring the theater with me into the army. It’s a collective thing. But writing and music—those are mine. I can take them anywhere. War is a strange catalyst. I’ve seen so many soldiers start to write. Poems. Books.”

There was a long pause.

Then, almost as an afterthought, he spoke again.

“And when the war ends... it’d be great to return to the theater. To perform again. Maybe even bring what I’ve lived through on stage. As an actor. As a musician. As someone who’s been there.”

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