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Director Boris LIJEŠEVIĆ
Set Designer, Costume Designer Mina ILIĆ
Composer Aleksandar KOSTIĆ
Dramaturge Branko DIMITRIJEVIĆ
Assistant Director and Video Material
Ognjen ISAILOVIĆ
Premiere:
January 23rd 2010 |
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CAST |
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Branka ŠELIĆ |
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Nebojša ILIĆ |
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Bojan ŽIROVIĆ |
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Jelena TRKULJA |
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| ATELIER 212 THEATRE - BELGRADE |
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The life of the Atelier 212 Theatre began on 12th November 1956 in the small theatre hall of the old ‘Borba’ before the audience of 212 chairs, with the premiere of Faustus directed by Mira Trailovic. It was founded by a group of actors, directors, writers and musicians at the moment when a need was felt for a theatre which would stage new avant-garde drama which had a major influence in Europe of that time. The Atelier 212 was the first theatre in Eastern Europe to play Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, 1956. This play’s great success opened the door to a number of other avant-garde dramas and authors to come: Sartre, Faulkner, Ionesco, Camus, Pinter, Adamov, Rożevicz, Joyce, Jarry, T. S. Eliot, Vitrac, Schisgal, Kopit, Genet - they all saw their first staging before the Yugoslav audiences here. The Atelier 212 Theatre discovered new Yugoslav authors and staged plays by Brana Crncevic, Aleksandar Popovic, Dusan Kovacevic... Mira Trailovic had been leading the Atelier 212 Theatre since the very beginning - at first, when Rados Novakovic and Bojan Stupica were at the helm of the theatre, she worked as the assistant manager, and then as its manager for many years to follow. Led by her, the Atelier brought down the boundaries of Yugoslavia and, in time, became a theatre known all over the world. Together with Jovan Ćirilov and other associates, Mira Trailovic initiated the establishment of one of the greatest European theatrical festivals, the BITEF festival, which was founded in 1967 in the Atelier 212 Theatre, where its now three-decades-long life began. After Mira Trailovic, Ljubomir Draskic, who had joined the theatre as a young director almost at its beginning, became the manager of this theatre. For the twelve years of his rule, the theatre took on new young artists enlarging its company, and got a new house. In 1992 the Atelier, with its adapted building, became one of the best equipped theatres in the Balkans. Its Great Stage now has 385 seats in the auditorium and the Theatre in the Basement Stage has 141. Its fifth manager was Nebojsa Bradic, who didn’t hold his position for long (not even one whole season). Former manager (from 1997 to 2009), actor Svetozar Cvetkovic, has been member of the theatre’s company for many years. Current manager is stage director Kokan Mladenović. Nowadays the Atelier has a permanent ensemble of 33 actors and actresses, but it keeps its doors open for artists who aren’t permanently engaged here. The greatest actors and actresses still perform on the Atelier stages, and the best domestic and international directors work with this company. New dramas by contemporary Serbian and foreign authors are staged here, where the theatre leaves its own recognizable mark on them. In the recent years this theatre’s plays have been tearing down the newly established geographical boundaries conquering the world once again. At the moment, side by side with the old, already anthological plays, new plays are performed on its stages ... |
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The history of Cultural Center of Pancevo has been inextricably connected with Pancevo’s theatre life which lasts for about 250 years. Theatre performances in Serbian language are linked to Joakim Vujic, “the father of Serbian theater”, who lived and worked in Pancevo since 1824. The golden age of Serbian theater was in the 1840s , when Nikola Djurickovic established a theater company with all the characteristics of a real theater. From the 1850s, till the break of the Monarchy in 1918 , traveling theaters had their performances in Serbo-Croatian, Hungarian and German language. At the beginning of 1945, the professional theater that worked in Pancevo became a section of Theater of Vojvodina in Novi Sad. In 1947,the Commission for the expropriation brought a decree to take the building of a wealthy trader Oskar Fisegrund, and make it a national property for theater use. The theater building was built that same year, 28 of December , and had 600 seats and a balcony. Today, this edifice is known as the Cultural Center of Pancevo. In those days, the art ensemble consisted of about 25 members, and in certain periods, more than 70 people were employed. In the period from 1944 – 1956, almost 2000 plays were performed on the home scene and 425 away. In1965, National Municipality Board decides to abolish the National Theater and turn it into Cultural Center. This decision of political authorities in Pancevo will have far-reaching consequences for the cultural life of the town. The institution was named the Center for Culture "Olga Petrov" Pancevo. In the years that followed the theater life developed in slow motion. Rare appearances of other theaters were supposed to create the impression that there are cultural events, and sporadic concerts of classical music, which usually occurred in the Big gallery, today's Gallery of contemporary art, had only educational character ( most often they were performed by the music school students). In 1980s, cultural life gets a new incentive. At that time was established the children’s stage, a traveling puppet troop and in 1988 the Children’s theater “Trubac”. In 1990s, the Center got its new look. The building was reconstructed (hall capacity is 380 seats, balconies have been removed, the lobby and ticket office were renovated) and the Center for Culture "Olga Petrov" changes its name to the Pancevo Center for Culture. In the sense of production, the Center turns more to the fine arts scene through a manifestation called Pancevo Exhibition of Yougoslav Sculpture, which later changes its name to Biennial of Visual Art. In 2006, it changed its name once again to the Cultural Center of Pancevo. Since then , the Center works more dynamically, it has a rich, diverse and quality program, investment activities are increased. As a result, at the end of 2006. the new building was built behind the stage. At the same time, the Center begins to create its own production, especially in the field of theater, establishing the Childen’s stage “Podji tuda...” (Go that way...). A contract on co-production with the National Theater in Belgrade was signed in December 2006, and it revived the ancient tradition of creating a theater production for adults. |
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P E R F O R M A N C E...... |
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Inspired by a piece by the German author Klaus Pohl, Waiting Room Germany, which was made from testimonies by the people who have, after the unification of Germany, found themselves in a new system and a new state, still waiting for the answer to which they were waiting for years, Boris Liješević starts researching in what way have our changes influenced personal lives of the people in Serbia at the beginning of the 21st century. He reworked the interviews together with the dramaturge Branko Dimitrijević in order to turn statements into dramatic monologues. To these monologues he then added monologues from the original piece, Waiting Room Germany, so the analogy between our society today and (the former Easter) German from 15 years ago would not be missed.
 www.atelje212.rs
Actors Speak
(...) A permanent feeling I am jumping into a pool with cold water... shock, and then pleasure when the body is used to it... and then the same fear...
Words are resounding in my head – minimal wage, connection to electricity, loan, layoff, my mother, her mother, the baby is crying, protest, Slobodan, baton, Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse in life size...
A strong feeling that the people we are dealing with have deserved to be on stage, and the question has the stage deserved it?
Nebojša ILIĆ |
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S E L E C T O R ' S...R E P O R T...... |
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The text, whose authors are Boris Liješević and Branko Dimitrijević, is
the first official case in Serbia of a verbatim play, as a base for verbatim
theatre. It is a form of a documentary, a text made by adapting a
series of conversation by the authors with real people, who revealed
their real, authentic experience in facing the consequences of social
transition (loss of a job, remembering the 1990s, yearning for a more
secure life). The concept of the play is specific, it does not have classical,
Aristotelian characters, nor a linear story, only fragments that
form a lively mosaic of existence in today’s Serbia. The stage in the
play is completely bare and desolate, illusion is expelled, even the
chairs on which the actors sit or lie are theatre chairs on which the
audience is placed. This is a complete stripping of the play, abolition
of illusion and direct confrontation of the viewer with the important
questions posed in the play, which assume a socio-political significance
because they directly problematise the post-October 2000 society in
an artistically valuable manner.
Ana TASIĆ |
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BORIS LIJEŠEVIĆ
Born in Belgrade in 1976. Graduated High School in Budva. In 1999, completed all the coursework at the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad, at the programme for Serbian Literature and Language, and in 2004 earned his B.A. at the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad, where he works as an assistant at the Department of Inter-Media Direction.
As an assistant director he worked for the plays directed by Jagoš Marković, Bora Drašković, Ljuboslav Majera, Omar Abu el Rub and collaborated for a few years in the plays by Tomi Janežič.
Director: Nikolay Evreinov, In the Backdrop of the Soul,Christopher Frei, Phoenix, Theatre 'Promena', Academy of Arts Novi Sad; W. Shakespeare, Two Gentlemen of Verona, Amateur Theatre 'Zmaj' Irig;B. Nušić, Opštinsko dete, National Theatre Kikinda; Fedor Šili, Belgrade – London (part of the project Beogradske priče 04), SKC Beograd; David Harrower, Presence, Atelier 212Belgrade;L. Hubner, Greta Page 89, Serbian National Theatre Novi Sad;Milena Bogavac, Dear Dad, Yugoslav Drama Theatre Belgrade; John Osborne, Look Back in Anger, National Theatre Belgrade and Cultural Centre Pančevo; Dušan Spasojević, Zverinjak, SNP Novi Sad; Yuri Polyakov, Kid in Milk, Youth Theatre Novi Sad;Miloš Jakovljević, Projekcija, National Theatre Sombor.
He lives and works between Belgrade, Novi Sad and Budva. |
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... not one answer existed. I had to wade through every question as through a tunnel. Every wrong answer can cost me a lot. How to protect oneself from that? Questions that come to mind have to be understood well. To be defined. To be loudly pronounced. To grasp what is required and why. In order to enable this dialectic, one has to understand his/her own ignorance and the ignorance of the final form. When the question is posed well, it is possible to find many answers. A completely wrong answer shows the direction one must not take. And it is already easier, the specter of possibilities is made narrower.
The right answer points to the next right answer. And each one is a step closer to the goal, the final form. With every step the view is clearer and it reaches farther... Somewhere deep in imagination, impressions, unclear images, colours, sounds jump out and invite you to go after them. You find yourself in some space you didn’t know existed. Suddenly, everything is pulsating, everything is filled with life. Rules don’t apply anymore, there is no danger on the road. Every road takes you somewhere. Time and space are not obstacles. There is no effort. Only one word is enough for the worlds of Liberties to be set into motion. Everything around you is speaking. One word collects various meanings. Everything becomes an expression. Body turns into a cry in which soul is revealed. Personal. Universal. Universe. Meaning.
Boris LIJEŠEVIĆ |
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BRANKO DIMITRIJEVIĆ
In life he mostly does writing, primarily plays and novels. Lately he has been writing plays for children and adults. In the Serbian National Theatre in Novi Sad, there are two of his plays shown, Godot on a Hot Tin Roof and Woody Allen’s Love Miseries, in Užice the children’s play Paradise Bird’s Rump (directed by Nikola Zavišić) in Podgorica Cocoa and Chocolate and Captain Black Beard, in Zemun puppet play Magic Tinder. With Boris Liješević he collaborated as dramaturge in the play Kid in Milk in the Youth Theatre in Novi Sad. |
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(...) And so it happens that I am sitting somewhere, thinking, and then I start up and see – I am in a waiting room. I look around, where am I, what am I waiting for, I don’t know but I know it is not necessary, that it could have been organised differently, I could have either not waited, or waited a lot less or... I am imagining we are, like in Pompeii, suddenly covered with lava and ashes and we are found after a few centuries; for everything else we would find an explanation – these people are buying something, those are doing some work, but what about those in hundreds of premises around the city, all in the same position, future anthropologists and archeologists are never going to be ab;e tp figure that out... And so, I am looking at those various people around waiting rooms and I am thinking, all of them have their own story, I am sure, like I have mine about my crime, that is with a foreign woman and about the return to the home town and about the stupidity of accepting work in a another city (...)
Branko DIMITRIJEVIĆ |
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Ascetics of Play and the Life’s Truth
The text Waiting Room, signed by Boris Liješević and Branko Dimitrijević, is the first (registered) case in Serbia of a verbatim play, as a base for verbatim theatre. It is a particular form of a documentary, a text made by adapting a series of conversation by the authors with real people, who had revealed their real, authentic experiences. The Waiting Room thus represents a true mosaic of today’s living (or survival) in Serbia, a picture of a traumatic adaptation to the new rules of social games. Confronting the brutal facelessness of (post)capitalist principles initiates a new, post and turbo, dramatic absurd, ten times darker and more hopeless than Beckett’s. The stage of the play Waiting Room is completely empty, bare, desolate; even the chairs on which the actors sit or lie are theatre chairs, where the audience is placed as well. Thus the position of the characters and the viewers is symbolically made equal: they, like us, are ceaselessly waiting for something, lurking for opportunities, hoping. It is a post-existentialist situation of the horror of waiting, without a vision or plan, sharpened and colossal, pushed to an even darker dead end. In one corner there is a bottle of water, from which characters occasionally drink, which is a rare trace of life (perhaps that water is some kind of replica to the tree in Waiting for Godot). In certain scenes, very rarely, briefly and timidly, a soft, but lively music is heard, tearing, at least for a while, the very painful and disturbing silence (composer Aleksandar Kostić). The music has the function of a contrast to the reigning hopelessness; it represents a burst of hope scraping through the cracks of general powerlessness.
The concept of the play is unusual, considering there are no classical, Aristotelian characters (nor action), only fragments, parts, reflections that represent some sort of metaphorical cuts, bold and bright traces on a social map of today’s Serbia. The actors Branka Šelić, Nebojša Ilić, Bojan Žirović and Jelena Trkulja in that unique set have managed quite resiliently and very convincingly, emotionally, sincerely, and at the same time equally homogeneously, as if they were one body. Parts of their characters blend one into the other, smoothly, discreetly and naturally, the monologues blend into dialogues, dialogues into monologues, creating a live torrent of various fates coming down from all sides.
The play Waiting Room by the director Boris Liješević is valuable as an introduction of the verbatim theatre form into Serbian production, as well as for its bare truthfulness, functional performing ascetics, a concept reduced to the power of text and the dedicated, searching actors’ play. Also, since the play depicts the falling apart of illusions and losing ground under the feet of a contemporary man, his tumbling and fall under the unbearable burden of the new, bureaucratic, faceless reality, it is a valuable art document about the adaptation to the new times. Still, the stress in our lives, nervous breakdowns, loss of privacy, substitution of proximity by virtual communication (facebook socialisation as a new paradigm), are painted with liberating humour. This is the humour of a desperate person, sorrowful and bitter, a straw for a drowning person, a stick for drawing out of live sand, but it is still a sparkle of hope, a sign of the survival of the soul in the chaos of floundering caused by the effort to outsmart the brutality of the system.
Ana TASIĆ, Politika, January 25th 2010 |
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