Bereczky Erzsébet (szerk.): Imre Madách: The Tragedy of Man. Essays about the ideas and the directing of the Drama (Budapest, 1985)
György Lengyel: Two Tragedy Production
not engendered by ideological problems or by the interpretation of the basic idea of the play, but by the search for a suitable new style of production. Even today I think that the gist of the problem lies in the scenic arrangement of the play. All productions I know of showed great differences in dramaturgy, in casting, and in the use of sets. Critics were also always looking for such elements in the directors’ conceptions of stage design and moving the actors on the stage, and interpretation of the parts as were new and differed from the tradition or from the previous production. It stands reason that the Tragedy — a work which can be interpreted in different ways — prompts critics to ideological discussions; in fact I think this a good tradition. Yet I have the feeling that during the past thirty years the various directors aimed, first and foremost, at a reinterpretation of the play, at finding new scenic solutions. The search for new styles was relegeted to the background, any attempt to change the tone stopped short with the intention. Theatrical critics were inclined to attach only secondary importance to such changes. Even if the main roles of the Tragedy were entrusted to outstanding actors representing widely different personalities the style remained basically the same. I shall always remember, as one of the greatest achievements of a great theatrical era, the marvellous actors of the 1955 production. They played amidst sets which Gusztáv Oláh crammed full of picturesque designs in the Meiningen style. This, however, does not permit us to disregard the fact that even when there was some change in interpretation, the same style kept recurring for several decades in our theatres — though not always on the very high level of the predecessors. Let me repeat, today I consider the contradiction between style of performance and interpretation, between updated approach to stage design and role conceptions the least solved and most exciting problem in staging the Tragedy. Two extremes appear time and again : either overstressed intellectualism and didactic style which explains to death the poetry of the work, or traditionbound fervour and enthusiasm. Both preclude a new conceptual approach and a rethinking of the basic idea of the poem. There are, of course, many other problems as well, to name but 63
