Ankara Sanat Tiyatrosu Bilkent Sahne

About Ankara Sanat Tiyatrosu Bilkent Sahne

Ankara Sanat Tiyatrosu, known as AST, is a private theatre company founded in Ankara on 6 December 1963 by Asaf Çiğiltepe and his colleagues, and it describes itself as Turkey's oldest established private theatre. Its current home is the AST Bilkent Sahne, a stage inside the Bilkent Center shopping centre in Bilkent; Bilkent Center announced that it was hosting the company in its 61st year. AST's own history page explains that it was set up as a progressive, ensemble-based art theatre. After Çiğiltepe died in an accident during a tour of eastern Turkey in 1967, Güner Sümer became artistic director, and Rutkay Aziz later led the company for many years. Over the decades its repertoire leaned towards modern world classics and gained a reputation as a "Brecht and Gorky theatre", and directors such as Genco Erkal and composers such as Timur Selçuk worked with the company. Bilkent Center states that AST has staged more than 170 plays since it was founded. The current repertoire listed on AST's website includes Dario Fo's Accidental Death of an Anarchist (Bir Anarşistin Kaza Sonucu Ölümü), Boris Vian's The Generals' Tea Party (Generallerin Beş Çayı), Bulaşıkçılar and the company's newer play İkinci Dereceden İşsizlik Yanığı, about unemployment among qualified people. The stage also hosts guest productions and stand-up shows, which appear on the ticketing calendars. Tickets are sold through biletinial and Biletix, and the box office phone is +90 312 417 76 76. AST also runs Akademi AST, offering drama classes for children and young people and acting workshops for adults, so the company remains a training ground as well as a stage.