Nora Henrik Ibsen on the stage of the National Theater was the last premiere of last year in Belgrade. It was shown somehow right at the time of the culmination of I Didn't Report, a hashtag under which twenty thousand women tweeted about the abuse or violence they had suffered in a few days.
This is the third performance of Nora on the stage of the National Theatre: the first was in 1889, only ten years after the premiere at the Royal Theater in Copenhagen, and the next - a century ago, in 1921.
Tatjana Mandić Rigonat, director of the latest Nore, evaluates that "it is amazing that this revolutionary drama was not in the repertoire of the National Theater for a whole century".
Nora is a woman who refuses to live according to social rules that do not suit her, she leaves her husband and a comfortable life, which was unthinkable in bourgeois Europe at the time. In Britain, Germany and Belgium, this play was performed with an altered ending: Nora changes her mind at the last moment and stays.
In Ibsen's version, Nora slams the door behind her and leaves. It turned out that this shock caused an awakening of awareness about hypocrisy and patriarchal dogma, but also a challenge to Nora's procedure. Since then, Nora is the beginning of any thinking on the topic of women's rebellion, and is significant for the development of feminism - the word that denotes this concept in Chinese is derived from Nora's name.
It is important to emphasize, however, that Ibsen did not write a feminist play: the decision to tell ne what doesn't suit you, even though society asks you to agree, applies to both men and women.
"Ibsen presented a woman faced with a deep drama, but strong enough to face the problem and take responsibility for her life, asking herself essential questions: is she an object or a subject, what are her thoughts, and what are imposed patterns of behavior" he explains Tatjana Mandić Rigonat, which are all reasons to be Nora plays "today, in a time when women all over the world are speaking out." ne, and theirs ne with various forms of abuse and restraint causes polemics, suspicions or acclamations."
The moment when Nora sees her position in the family as a big lie is, according to the director, the moment of Nora's enlightenment after which "all her decisions will be hers, there will be no reflection in the eyes of others and fulfillment of other people's concepts of how to live." Having your own thoughts, your own decisions, taking responsibility for your life - that's the essence. Nora begins her revolution to change society by researching and changing herself."
The newest Nora of the National Theater is played by Nada Shargin. "The piece is dominated by money, it is what we live in today, something that solves all problems, and it turns out that this is not true." Nora was raised by her father to be like a doll (the second title of this play is A doll's house), that's how her husband treated her, it was imperative that she be always cute and well-groomed."
Nada Shargin emphasizes that now "such a look of a woman is encouraged by social networks, to be perfect, which is too much pressure. That's why Nora wonders who she really is" and recalls that in Ibsen's time, such questions were a big blow to society, and that "they are still relevant today, but people accept them more easily only because, fortunately, they are being asked more and more. The most important thing is for a person to look at himself and not live in self-punishment, but to focus all his efforts on being the best version of himself."
Nada Shargin does not see the point of the play in the fact that Nora left her husband, but that she "pointed a strong spotlight at herself". Nora says ne to a system that devours people, to a society that is based on money, to a family that is not good, and leaves with the intention of changing himself and changing society.
The previous Nora, a century ago, was played by Lidija Vasilievna Mansvyetova in the National Theater. The Russian-born woman, as an established actress in Odessa, found herself in Belgrade at the National Theater after the October Revolution. Apart from Belgrade, she also acted in theaters in Zagreb, Sarajevo and Split. She stood out as Anna Karenina, Leda, Baroness Castelli, and Melita. She was the director of several drama and opera performances. She was the director of Drama at the Croatian National Theater in Split. She was buried in Split in 1963.
In Tatjana Mandić's play Rugonat, in addition to Nada Šargin, Nenad Stojmenović, Hadži Nenad Maričić, Katarina Marković, Goran Jevtić and Jelena Blagojević also play.
The first performance of Nora this year will be on January 20.
S.Ć. /NovaS/ SEEcult
