Antigone

New-old ''Antigone''

It is not a rare case in the theatre that we who create performances are not satisfied - at least not entirely - with what we have created. The possibilities for an error are innumerable. At a certain point the performance might be lacking in vision and courage, skill and knowledge, imagination and focus. However, in a repertorial theatre the play must be performed according to its schedule, opening nights are planned a year ahead and cannot be rescheduled, because three days later the work on a new play begins and this new play, just like the one we have just completed, is going to be developed for two, three months at the most and that will be it. Within that time frame one needs to work out and shape something that would, we hope, live on as long as possible, sometimes for years, sometimes even more than a decade.
The renewal of a performance that was lucky to live on for a long time is a common practice, but experience has taught us that, as a rule, this renewal is a mere refreshment, remembering and solidifying of that which has been forgotten, neglected and ignored during the period of time the play has been performed, or better yet, not been performed. Creating a truly new performance on the ruins - or, more optimistic, on the layout - of the old is an exception, which is not exclusive to Croatian theatre. That is to say, despite the possible dissatisfaction with the result, the director, the actors and the supporting crew, immediately after the opening night, move on to new employments, sometimes in other cities and countries and haven't got either time or possibility, or even concentration for a thorough redoing of that which they have already presented to the audience and the expert public as a finished product. Although, as everyone who works in the theatre knows, the notion of a finished product does not exist on the stage.
Jean Anouilh's ''Antigone'', which had its opening night in ''Gavella'' Theatre on September 15th, 2012 is an example of the aforementioned exception. In the spring of 2013, after 25 performances in front of a mostly sell-out audience, the director Aleksandar Popovski, the cast of the play and the creative team decided to continue their work on the play which premiered six months ago. The result is a new-old ''Antigone'', a production which shares with its predecessor the textual model, the cast and the names of the entire supporting crew and yet in many ways it differs from it.
By being thoroughly dramaturgically reshaped as well as thought out more deeply in terms of the direction, and consequently significantly changed regarding the visual characteristics of the stage and the costumes, this ''Antigone'' differs from its predecesssor first and foremost in the actors' emergence in their roles and new solutions that spring out as the result of it, in terms of the idea, concept and mis en sc?ne. Antigone, Creont, the Chorus, the Guard, Haemon, Ismene, the Nurse, the Messenger, the Maestro and the Page are still telling us the same story, one that now sounds and means something new: the motifs are the same, the reading has changed, both from this side as well as from the other side of the stage.
Dubravko Mihanović

''A positive presedan on Croatian stage has happened in ''Gavella'' Theatre: the cast and the director Aleksandar Popovski have continued their work on the play after the opening night improving it significantly. (...) In the new, more mature interpretation of Antigone's character Dijana Vidušin has certainly enacted the character's solitude, her fear of the consequences that her rebellious gesture brought, as well as the pleasure of the rebellion. She established a self-chosen, but also a painful distance from the rest of the group. (...) Grabarić has masterfully enacted Creont as a ruling snake elegantly wrapping itself around its throne, knowing that the poison serves only to be used by the authority: whether it's serving Socrates the usual dosage of hemlock or ceremonially escorting Antigone to the tomb.'' (Nataša Govedić, Zarez)