"We always expect others to create a better world for us"

After four premiere nights, the screening of the dramatic adaptation of the novel "Celestina" by Fernando de Rojas, directed by Milan Nešković, which was co-produced by the Budva Festival with the Yugoslav Drama Theater from Belgrade, ended at the Gradu Teatr.

The staging of this "tragi-comic story of Callisto and Malibeia", as stated in the subtitle of one of the most important works of classical Spanish and European literature, written by De Rojas in the 33th century, was also announced as the main event of the XNUMXrd City of Theater. For the director Milan Nešković (whose work the Budva audience got to know through the performances "Bela Kafa" and "Prometheus's Way", which were hosted at the festival a few years ago), as he says in an interview with "Vijesti", this first direction at the Gradu Theater is and a great honor.

"It is a festival that has had a significant reputation in the region for more than two decades precisely because of its productions and co-productions, at which the biggest names of directors in this area were present. I can say that I am satisfied with how the audience received 'Celestina', De Rojas's novel is more than five centuries old, its greatest value is precisely in the fact that it opens some timeless questions about the immutability of human nature and character, and we have seen that that the text could "fly" through time and become a contemporary story about us today", said Nešković.

Was this text your only guide for that story about the eternal human passion for money, power, interest...?

Before I started working on the play and the two-month rehearsals at JDP, I received some fee and I traveled around Andalusia for ten days. I wanted to use my senses to feel that climate that I had only known through literature and movies. It is a fascinating Mediterranean area in every sense, and above all in the fact that people live there with too much passion for everything. I think that here, in the region, we are very similar to Andalusians, because we somehow suffer from that excess of passion, which sometimes brings something beautiful, but much more often gets us into all kinds of problems, personal, intimate, social, political.

We have seen that this world - in which personal interests are above all else - begins on stage with a fluttering game, lines that the audience laughs at, so that in the end everything turns into a tragedy. What were the deviations from De Rojas's novel?

On the one hand, we wanted to stay true to the spirit of Spain, and on the other, to transpose that medieval world into modern times, and this "tragi-comedy about Callisto and Malibeja" offers a number of contemporary and timeless themes. "Selestina" is a story about a world where material things take precedence over everything else, about a world of unscrupulousness, fraud, manipulation, instant gratification, a world where empathy and sincere emotions have long since been overcome, or ironically, they are possessed by those from whom we least expect it. That was our starting point; we played with comedy styles, from which tragedy is slowly born. It turns out that the border is thin, which says a lot about ourselves, and about the world we live in, which is both tragic and comical at the same time, it's just a matter of which angle we look at it.

Celestina, who is the embodiment of all negativity, says: "He who does not seek me, I will not seek him either", which raises the question of whether she is really the initiator of all evil. Is that also the main motive of the play - that a man should first face his own actions?

Celestina, in that world of lies, mimicry, hypocrisy, corruption, which make up our mutual relations, in which personal interest is above all other moral and human values, is actually the only one who does not hide who she is. Celestina does not lie that she is better than what they say about her, and she is the only one who stands behind her actions. By doing all these bad things, she actually exposes the people around her and shows who they really are. And they, of course, are not much better than her. Because, in life, we tend to always look for the culprits in others, not in our own actions and characters, for everything bad that happens to us. We always look at others worse than ourselves, someone else is always responsible, and we always expect others to change something in our societies to make it better, to be brave, to do something good for all of us. That's why the key to this play is precisely in the accuracy of human characters - everything we live in, our corrupt societies, our insincere interpersonal relationships, lies, fraud, political populism and a world where only money is important, we created it all ourselves, each of us. Or with our weakness we allowed it to be created, and this again confirms that the responsibility lies with us, the individual. In the play "Celestina" there is another important moment - when for the purpose of "higher interest" a pact is made with evil, and it always ends tragically - and the purest man gets dirty and dies. But we see it all every day and live it in our own lives.

Do you still need to show your own attitude towards a world that is in a mess, politically, socially, morally, culturally, emotionally...?

When, for example, I did one of my favorite plays, "White Coffee", I encountered many problems, why I didn't decide, why I didn't take the side of either the Partisans or the Chetniks, which is the story of two brothers who were in the war on two different sides. But even Aleksandar Popović, who wrote that play, did not do that. It is not my duty to implement my views, but to raise the question of what, for example, leads to two brothers being on two sides at the same historical and social moment, and this is still happening today, how did we come to this in the first place, and how we will continue our life together. That's my general view on dealing with the problem.

Do you, for example, not go to civil protests on Saturdays, where numerous representatives of Belgrade's artistic and intellectual life gather, based on these principles?

I'm afraid that we have more and more artists in our region, but also beyond, who, incorporating their own views, draw a line that is even too close to fascist views - if you think the way I think, then you're with me, if you don't think the way I say, then you are against me. Unfortunately, we live in a context where you have to be either for these or for those, that you have to decide between these two. This bipolarity in the repressive system directly encourages us to be even worse.

I don't make plays for administrators or politicians, but for the audience

In your plays, you generally do not show political rebellion against the system. Why?

For me, the theater is a place to confront the social and political circumstances in which we live, but I am not an advocate of political theater. For me, that would be like making a political forum on stage, which is the same as when a political party rents a hall and holds a meeting. I'm sure that my play would not be more significant or artistically valuable if it shouted "Vučić to the fag", or I don't know what else. I simply do not feel any obligation or responsibility towards any political structure, and I consider that my political views are completely irrelevant in the theater.

I started working on the play "Impure Blood" at the National Theater in Belgrade at the moment when Prime Minister Ana Brnabić directly appointed a new director of the theater. And what was I supposed to do, stop rehearsals and say no, I'm not going to do it, to, like, oppose that policy? Or did the very act of my continuing to work on the play, which was agreed upon with the previous administration, mean to someone that I tacitly support that ruling structure? I don't make plays for managers or politicians, but for the audience. Or, what should I do when the president of the country comes to one of my plays, and the former one came, and the current one. Who am I to tell anyone that they can't come to the theater, or that my play can't be played, because there is so-and-so in the audience? I'm not interested in that, doing my job I'm just trying to reflect the time we live in, to communicate with that time, and to understand the heroes I'm talking about, whatever they may be. In doing so, I will be walking parallel to the system, and I have no problem with that, because I neither belong to that system, nor do I know how it functions, nor does it concern me in my theater work.