Aleksandr Popov – “Prügipedagoog” | Kuressaare

From nightclub security guard to teacher? If that sounds like a bad joke, that’s because it is. Except it really happened. “Prügipedagoog” is Aleksandr Popov’s new full-length stand-up show about how a nightclub security guard became a teacher overnight—just a few days after losing his father. It is a story about grief, burnout, the school system, and a man who was handed a piece of chalk, a gradebook and a classroom full of children one day and told: “Here. Try not to ruin anyone.”

I was a nightclub security guard with two higher-education degrees in my pocket. Two degrees don’t make a right, and the turntable needle doesn’t tremble! One morning, I had a missed message on my phone—the vassal of the temple of education had invited me for an interview. A friend apparently thought I might be able to survive in front of a classroom full of budding scholars. I had survived nightlife until then…

I didn’t believe for a moment that they would hire me. Surely the need couldn’t be that desperate! Let’s be honest—I’m exactly the kind of guy whose closet has enough skeletons to fill several republics. More than enough to supply an entire production line of wardrobes. But apparently despair had taken over the school building. The new school year was just around the corner. And so it happened—I became a teacher.

Days after learning of my father’s death, I stood in front of my first class—the most demanding audience I had ever encountered. This is the story of a man who was never meant to become a teacher—a walking contradiction, the poster boy of Sewer Glamour, an ape-like specimen, ugly as the darkest night! A human wreck in danger of falling apart, held together by sarcasm, grief and a willpower on the verge of extinction.

I am not the man you would want teaching your children—unless you want them to see with their own eyes what happens to a person who begins to crack under questions intended for an intelligent life-form.

Prügipedagoog is the second entry in the trilogy “50 Shades of a Security Guard” from its creator—a backstory that should never have come into existence. The prologue “HALBUM” is living proof of that! No skills. No preparation. No plan. Only grief… and a desperate need to prove that as long as his heart is still beating, he can still be of use, even if he is useless.

At the door at night. In front of the class by day. Always a problem. Never simply a solution. And yet his trembling hand holds up the torch of the educational flame that is trying to go out.

Aleksandr Popov – “Prügipedagoog”

The show is in Estonian and lasts approximately 2 hours, including an interval.

Doors open at 18:30
Start at 19:00

Tickets on sale at Fienta.ee
“Viielise” ticket €10/15 – on sale until 31.08.2026
“Hilineja” ticket €16/19
“Toetaja” ticket from €25

The tour is organised by Aleksandr Popov & House of Palagan
Tour information: info@palagan.ee
Media contact: merily@palagan.ee