Clash of style and structure

Hilarious tragedy Dušan Kovačević directed by Jagoš Marković is a new play by the National Theater. It has not been talked about enough, but it is important to emphasize that Dušan Kovačević has a significant anniversary this year - 50 years of active work on our stage. Such a significant jubilee should definitely be marked with a performance on the main stage of one of the oldest and most important theater institutions in the country - the big stage of the National Theater in Belgrade. truth be told, Hilarious tragedy it is neither among the most famous nor the most significant theater plays of this writer and is therefore not the expected choice for this kind of occasion. On the other hand, an active attitude towards one's own tradition is reflected in its constant questioning, finding new interpretations and discovering neglected values.

Hilarious tragedy was performed for the first time in March 1991 on the stage of the Zvezdara Theater under the direction of the writer himself. It was an extremely turbulent time when events (pre)arrived one after the other, and concerned the disintegration of socialist Yugoslavia and the open conflict of the opposition and citizens with Slobodan Milošević (the first large demonstrations against Milošević, the so-called March XNUMXth demonstrations and demonstrations in Terazije). The entire social and political system of the country was shaking from its foundations and the citizens really had the feeling that they were living a hilarious tragedy - hilarious because everything was happening hilariously fast, and a tragedy because everything was clearly leading to a tragic denouement. Dušan Kovačević then appeared in front of the audience with a piece in which he asked at least three important questions for the current moment: what happens to the family and the individual in turbulent times, what is the mutual relationship between the social disaster and family relations and what will happen to the generation that grows up in that time and in such a family. Hilarious tragedy in its form, it corresponded to the hilariously tragic time in which it was created - one twist in the plot replaces another, and the paradoxes pile up. Everything happens so vaudeville-like fast that the audience can barely grasp what is happening when and to whom. What actually happens is less important than the feeling that the plot grinds the heroes. The most dramatic and memorable scene of the Zvezdara Theater play was the one when Neven (Anica Dobra) swings strongly in the swing, wondering who he is. The swing flies over half of the ground floor and we all feel a terrible discomfort - on the one hand, we feel sorry for the hero, on the other hand, we shy away from the swing that flies right above our heads. Neven, brilliantly played by Anica Dobra, was a metaphor for our painfully uncertain and dangerous future in 1991. And what is today for us? Hilarious tragedy?

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The first and basic question is, do we perceive our present moment as a hilarious tragedy? Secondly, the basis of the conflict in the play is the conflict between the generations of Neven's grandfathers, one of whom is a communist and the other a respectable pre-war citizen. For the writer, this conflict is the foundation of socialist Yugoslavia and the evil karma of the family. What conflict is our society based on today and how does it affect the modern family? Thirdly, in the play (almost) everything is to blame for the senile father, a former communist, who in his time liked to shoot at the "living wall". In these thirty years, the way in which the Yugoslav communist movement is perceived has evolved a lot - from open contempt to nostalgic memory. What are communists to us today and is there someone who is to blame for (almost) everything, did he shoot at the "living wall" and how did he profit from it? Fourth, little Neven was 12 years old at the time the play takes place. Today, he could be the father of a new Neven. What kind of man did Neven grow into and what kind of Neven did he get? Fifth, considering everything that happened in our schools, what can we expect from the new generations?

These are just some of the questions that arise while reading Hilarious tragedies, but those questions did not seem to concern director Jagoš Marković at all. He did not intervene on the text of the play - he did not shorten or change it, but he did not delve deeper into its challenges, but followed the autopoetics from his previous plays. It is quite legitimate for the director to have his own style, but it is not good when the director's style collides with the structure of the play, and that is what happened here. Hilarious tragedy is a fast vaudeville piece, and Jagoš Marković slowed it down, often stopping the flow of the action with long musical parts. He did this persistently and systematically from the beginning to the end of the play, which is very bad for a piece like this because instead of being carried away by its speed, we question the (il)logic of the story. The situation is further aggravated by the accumulation of actions that may be effective at first glance, but create confusion in the way we understand the characters. Why does Rajna (Sandra Bugarski) arrive on a bicycle, and Vasilije (Branko Vidaković) goes on foot, if they are coming together? Why does Milan (Željko Erkić) shave and ride an exercise bike at the same time?

Why a stuffed tiger on the proscenium and why are a bunch of wall clocks and an upside-down tree hanging above the heads of the characters (set designer Matija Vučićević)? Why does something keep falling from above onto the stage? The play is full of beautiful, poetic, melancholic and nostalgic images that follow Jagoš Marković from one play to another, but they have nothing to do with the style in which it was written. Hilarious tragedy.

The actors of the National Theater (Nikolina Friganović, Željko Erkić, Nela Mihailović, Aleksandar Vučković, Sandra Bugarski, Branko Vidaković, Ljubiša Savanović and Marija Nedeljkov) had more feeling for the way the play was written. Between long musical sections they played fast and with a lot of persiflage. Nela Mihailović (Julka) and Branko Vidaković (Vasilije) were particularly effective. She played a simple woman from the people who goes through life balancing on crutches and who is unreasonably attached to a drunken and aggressive husband. That's why we sometimes found her funny, sometimes we pitied her, and sometimes we admired her ability to balance both literally and metaphorically in an impossible situation. Branko Vidaković played the grandfather (i.e. the senile father) Vasilij as a man who is apparently slow and naive, but with whom you are never really sure whether he is crazy or making everyone around him crazy. It is completely unclear why the director decided to have a boy (Petar Vasiljević) play Nevena in a play in which there is absolutely nothing realistic. Child actors are often very good and believable on film because they act "in pieces", but theater requires continuity of play. Putting a boy to rival the pros for an entire play is just not fair.

Maybe someone in the audience will like this playful and wild baroque theater of paintings. However, the opportunity was missed to open up the question of the relevance of the piece itself and to conclude something about our relationship to the time in which the piece was created, the consequences of which we are still living today. We are most sorry for that, because only the answers to these questions make the dramatic tradition alive and significant. Jubilees are just the icing on the cake.