Sreten Asanović, Nomina, Plima, Ulcinj, 2011
By: Ivana Ančić
English version will be available soon.
Death is not a Bicycle (So That They Could Steal It From You) by Biljana Srbljanović, directed by Slobodan Unkovski, Yugoslav Drama Theatre, Belgrade
By: Vanja Nikolić
Death is not a Bicycle (So That They Could Steal It From You) is an excellent title of a new text by Biljana Srbljanović. With an effect of a slogan for a new product, the title of the play stormed the market as the performance of the month in June this year. It seems that the campaign has been a success. The Great Stage of the Yugoslavian Drama Theatre is also sold out for November and the audience is amazed.
We must ask ourselves is this amazement a result of an artistic value of the play, that manages to transfer the real emotion to the audience, or is it a result of a very good campaign and popularity of the writer, the director and that of the actors? Some of the media described them as la crème de la crème?! Considering that this play can hardly be called a triumph, we are given the opportunity for contemplation on domestic audience, its system of values and the effect of the media. But why are the directors unable to answer the challenges in Biljana Srbljanović’s pieces?
The text Death is Not a Bicycle (So That They Could Steal It From You) is a sort of sequel of Biljana Srbljanović’s previous texts, The Grasshoppers and The Barbelo, on Dogs and Children. She uses the well known characters, but places them in new situations and contexts. With fragmented dramaturgy, she intertwines worlds and lives of her heroes, setting in front of us an archetypal topic of relationships between parents and children, death, growing up, impossibility to grow up and unsuitability which she tells through the relationship between a father and his daughter Nadežda, whose character we know very well from other dramas of the same writer. The always actual topic in Biljana Srbljanović’s texts is contemplation on and criticism of the political system, this time embodied in the character of Gospođa (The Mrs), as well as the absurd life of the dubious elite, that is, of the people that they are surrounded by and that humbly work for them; Drobac, Alexandra and Debela.
All heroes are set in their own worlds, private and public spaces. They are set in a very precise and clear moment in today’s Serbia. That moment is the death of the Patriarch, his funeral and the grief of the nation. The death of the Patriarch is not only a frame and a context. In Biljana’s text, it is one of the most important topics based on her political view of the most privileged and extremely strong institution in the State – the Church. This text is strongly criticises the Church on all levels. Children are indoctrinated through the Religious Education which they end up misusing as hatred, the State is interlinked with the Church and uses the death of the Patriarch as justification for inactivity and negligence of the ill and continues to use to imposed value system of the Church.
This element is not part of the play. To this, definitely the most provocative thread in the text, Slobodan Unkovski paid no attention to. He was dealing with the characters and with their relationships, but only as much as he needed to get to the comical line of the story. Hence, he missed to equally use and build in layers the three relationships between children and parents, between Nadežda and her father, the Mrs and Alex, between Debela and Father who is not present. He did not manage to achieve the depth, the poetics and the emotionality offered within the text. Without this micro-level, which considers the destiny of an individual, it is hard to achieve that macro-level which is political, engaged and critical.
That is why the biggest problem of the play is the apolitical view of the director. Hence, there is no chanting, no sounds of services and of prayers for the Patriarch, that were an everyday occurrence for us right after his death. They are a part of our reality in this text, that which bothers our heroes. They remind us of a death of a close person, that is not as valued as that of the Patriarch, because he is the great one. The deaths of the non-baptized communists are not noted, because they are not watching the funeral of the Patriarch but Walter Defending Sarajevo. This is the political side of the text and its general value. The conflict of the two eras, the past one when people knew what they did not believe in and the present one where they think they know what they believe in. Unkovski’s most direct dialogue that hints at this topic is underspoken, the audience did not react to it with laughter, as it should have, and that is the sad-funny part – just as our reality.
Unkovski was searching for another type of laughter…Everyone is backstage, the metal, rusty construction that covers the whole stage. Such a remote, inconspicuous and unwanted place is provided for those that can describe themselves in the same way. This space hides more than it exposes, because the basic elements of the stage define any living room, dinning room, waiting room and a very clearly defined room of the VMA hospital. This generality of space allows the characters and the situations to become more typical and the text to convert from drama to comedy, which sometimes becomes very general and banal. If reading a text with a lot more potential for drama and poetry, as a comedy, we do not understand who the characters that we are watching are and it seems that the actors can not understand how to act.
Somewhere between comedy and dramatic over-acting, they try stick with their characters. The most successful one was Anita Mančić, who seems to have been reading her text carefully and managed to construct the character of the ironic Nadežda, emotional and devoted daughter, at the same time strong and gentle. Svetlana Bojković builds her character of The Mrs meticulously, a female politician, who sometimes draws parallels with the famous character of gospođa Ministarka (Mrs Secretary). Vojislav Brajević plays the father successfully, using the more comical means to emphasise his illness and old age, proudly but unskillfully hiding his fear of death. The director’s choice for this role is obviously wrong, because the text demands an old man who can see the approaching death. Using more non-verbal means, Goran Šušljik achieves a character of a spoiled and headstrong psychiatrist and immature son who uses his lack of seriousness to run away from reality. Using the same means in creating their characters, Branislav Lečić in the role of Drobac, Ljubomir Bandović in the role of Sergeant Major Jokić, Sloboda Mićalović as Alexandra, Ivana Vuković as The Teenager create caricatures of their roles based in general places.
The fear of death in the text, becomes the director’s fear of the text itself and of taking on provocative topics. The audience may be content with such a play, but it is also deprived. The play gives a careless sensation of “bread and games”, not a serious “slap in the face” that would wake someone up.
Sreten Asanović, Nomina, Plima, Ulcinj, 2011
By: Ivana Ančić
English version will be available soon.
OSMI I SEDMI PUTNIK, Aleksandar Bjelogrlić, Citadela, Agora, Zrenjanin, 201
By: Dalibor Plečić
English version will be available soon.
Stjepan Gulin, Paz’te sad, paz’te sad (Meandarmedia, Zagreb, 2011.)
Authors: Ivana Ančić
Igor Marojević, Kroz glavu (Dosije, Beograd, 2012.)
Author: Dalibor Plečić
Damir Miloš, Pisa. Povratak (Meandarmedia, Zagreb, 2011.)
Author: Morena Livaković
POLITIČKE I DRUŠTVENE KONSTRUKCIJE IDENTITETA U VIDEO-PERFORMANSIMA NA BEOGRADSKOJ SCENI 1970-ih
Esej Vladimira Bjeličića
Esej u celini možete pročitati na portalu SEEcult.org
Esej Tihane Bertek
Od promatrača do sudionika
GALERIJA KAPELICA I POST-JUGOSLAVENSKI BODY ART (1995–2010)
Esej – Bojan Krištofić
Esej o radovima Šejle Kamerić, Maje Bajević i Nebojše Šerića Shobe
Piše: Slađana Golijanin
ESEJ – Razvaline socijalizma kao inspiracija za muzejske eksponate Mrđana Bajića i skulpturalne dosetke Ivana Fijolića
By: Milena Milojević
Piše: Nino Kovačić
Gostujuća izvedba šibenskog HNK, Pir malograđana, prema tekstu mladog Bertolda Brechta (napisan 1919.) izvedena je po sljedećoj formuli: na Danima satire u satiričkom kazalištu Kerempuh gledamo satiričan komad. Prema reakcijama publike, bila je uspješna, ali teško se oteti dojmu da je smijeh bio formulaično zagarantiran, jer bi takav instruirani moment humora trebao zauzdati spontani smijeh. Je li se možda radilo o “malograđanskom” humoru?
Glumice i to, KNAP, Zagreb, premijera 12.5.2012.
Piše: Nino Kovačić
Glumice i to, nova predstava u zagrebačkom KNAP-u, neobičan su kazališni ‘slučaj’. Naime, predstavu su, dramaturški i režijski osmislile te, naravno, glumački ostvarile četiri mlade glumice. U trenutačnoj opće-društvenoj, pa tako i kazališnoj situaciji, kojom prijete olovni pojmovi poput recesije, prekarijata i outsourcinga (nedavno su najavljena i otpuštanja “hladnopogonskih” glumaca), one su, kako piše u najavi “nezaposlene i pune entuzijazma, odlučile su preuzeti stvar u svoje ruke i napraviti hit!”. Očito sklone postdramskom pristupu izvedbi koji se, između ostalog, bazira na ekipnoj work-in-progress metodi, izvedbenoj anti-iluziji i autoreferencijalnosti, glumice/autorice su se “trgnule” i napravile parodiju o tome kako rade predstavu, po ironičnom ključu: kad ne ide pravljenje predstave treba napraviti predstavu o tome kako se ne može raditi predstava.
“Nije život biciklo”, Biljana Srbljanović, režija: Anselm Veber, Produkcija: Šaušpilhaus Bohum, Nemačka; Sterijino pozorje 2012, selekcija Nacionalne drame i pozorišta
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.
„Grebanje, ili kako se ubila moja baka“, Tanja Šljivar, režija: Selma Spahić, Bosansko narodno pozorište Zenica/Bitef teatar-Hartefakt (Beograd), premijera: 7. septembar 2012. (Zenica), 11. oktobar 2012. (Beograd)
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.
„Sluga dvaju gospodara“, Karlo Goldoni, režija: Boris Liješević, Grad teatar Budva/Srpsko narodno pozorište Novi Sad/Narodno pozorište „Toša Jovanović“ Zrenjanin, premijera: 27. jul 2012.
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.