Yesterday's announcement by the European director, this year's curator Bitef Festival Miloš Lolić and Borisav Matić, a member of his artistic team, in which they claim that the Bitef Board censored the arrival of the famous theater director Milo Rau at the 59th edition of the Belgrade International Theater Festival, caused stormy reactions from the public. It was rated yes such a decision by the members of the Board is not ethical and it was suggested that Bitef should not be held this year and wait for some more free times.
Based on what he told Vreme Svetozar Cvetković, President of the Bitef Board, it seems that a way has been found for the 59th edition of the Bitef festival to be held after all. We quote his statement in full:
"Yesterday, Miloš Lolić and Borisav Matić went public with their comments in a letter that was published in 'Danas' and then in other media, which refers to the situation in which Miloš Lolić, as curator of the Bitef program, and Borisav Matić, as part of his team, found themselves after the double rejection of the proposed program for this year's Bitef. I say double, because the Board voted on the proposed program on two occasions and after my attempt to reach a consensus that would lead to some resolution. unfortunately, it was decided by the majority of votes that the program should be rejected.
The director's name was decisive.
As written in the memo published in the media, the problem arose, in my opinion, not with the quality and content of Milo Rau's play. Pelico Process, which I at least discussed, citing both critics and successes as well as the specificity of the play that treats the court process that exposed the mass rape scandal in which Gisele Pellicot's husband invited men to rape his wife via social networks. Both the theme and the play caused very violent reactions at the premiere in Vienna, and later in Avignon. Yes, I thought that this play should be part of our repertoire.
In deciding on the program that Lolić and his team offered to the Festival Board, in this case it was not the play that was judged, but the director's name. My feeling was that I was too loud because Milo Rau's name was censored because of the event at the opening of last year's festival, that is, his speech on that occasion.
Milo Rau's speech does not offend anyone
Between two votes at two different sessions with the presence of all active members of the Board, Bitef Theater management as well as Miloš Lolić himself, I asked everyone present for a little patience and read Milo Rau's full speech at the opening of the 58th Bitef. All those present basically agreed with my opinion that there was nothing in the speech that would in any way insult the city of Belgrade, the festival, the country, politics or anything related to a single person in Serbia, on the contrary, that the speech promoted exclusive affection for Bitef, great respect for Belgrade and recognition of the bravery of the Bitef festival. I directed everyone present to that. The edge of Milo Rau's speech was aimed at the then Chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, and his policy of mining lithium and thus desecrating the environment in which people live in Serbia.
Regardless, I was outvoted again in the new vote.
Resignations
As someone who proposed Miloš Lolić to be the curator of the festival, which all the members at one time accepted by acclamation, I feel responsible that I did not succeed in getting the proposal of the festival program to get the green light, regardless of all the other proposed performances and the solid concept of the program, I informed the founder of Bitef in writing to relieve me of the position of chairman of the Board and that I will perform the same duty until a new chairman is chosen because the appointment of the City Assembly obliges me.
Regardless of the fact that Milo Rau, after his speech at the opening of the 58th Bitef and stormy reactions, received the "Politics Award" for his play performed at the festival, there were not enough votes to present his play to the audience in Belgrade this time. In order to get out of this situation and keep Bitef alive and existing, together with Miloš Lolić and Miloš Latinović, the director of Bitef Theater, we reached an agreement on the mutual termination of the contract because we stayed in a deadlock that did not lead to progress for three weeks. With the legal service of Bitef Theater and lawyer Miloš Lolic, such an agreement was made official and reached.
We are working on holding the festival
With good intentions, I agreed with the management of Bitef and the Board that we invite a play as the central event of the festival Bros Romeo Castelluccia, who was in Miloš's selection, and to work on holding the festival. For this, the agreement on mutual termination was reached that the festival can use one title from the program defined by Lolić. Despite the indignation that as a result of the Board's vote on his selection, censorship was implemented over the selection of one author, we both wanted the festival to stay alive and be preserved, and perhaps according to Miloš's suggestion, even with one or two titles.
My contact with Lolić on that occasion is with mutual good intentions, even if he is no longer officially part of that program.
However, I came before the Board with several proposals that I hope will be possible to implement.
Finally, and outside of Bitef, Miloš and I had the idea to personally invite Milo Rau next year and have him perform a play that did not pass the Bitef Board this year.
We owe that much to ourselves and to an important artist. Everyone!!!"
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