Gál Éva: Margaret Island - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2000)

THE WATER TOWER

50 metre wide and 150 metre deep stage. Kaffka took the trouble to include the water tower in the construction: a covered passageway was built around the tower and spotlights were mounted towards its top, 40 metres above the ground. The area was turned into a fine parkland: 4500 bushes and 20,000 flowers were planted, slabs of turf covering 8000 square metres were laid down, and the centuries-old trees around the stage were left standing. Plays produced in the year of the theatre’s opening included A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Csongor and Tünde and St. Margaret’s Legend. Acquired by the Opera, the theatre later performed Aida, Trubadúr, I Pagliacci, the ballet Sylvia and many more performances in which the island’s enchanting natural scenery can be put to breathtaking use.

The melancholy state of disrepair in which the theatre and its environments have been allowed to fall is both incomprehensible and inexcusable. One can only hope

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