After the exciting and active year 2022 at the City Theatre, nothing less is expected from the current one, is the conclusion of the conversation with the director of that theater company Stevan Koprivica. It is certain, he tells "Vijesti", that 2023 will be the year of moving into the long-awaited building, and they already have a plan for which show the new stage will be opened with.
Koprivica claims that the building will be functional and that the situation in which the Music Center found itself, with its many flaws, will not repeat itself. In addition, he announces the upcoming repertoire, numerous co-productions and reveals which directors are engaged... Gradsko continues with his travels, and as particularly important is his participation in the theater Olympiad in Budapest, with the play "The Taming of the Shrew" which will close the event.
About the theater scene in Montenegro, he says that it is in indirect proportion to the state of society and notes that crises inspire creators, and that theater is always a kind of resistance movement...
The City Theater Day ceremony, on December 27, closed the year 2022, which on that occasion was, in a way, summed up when it comes to that theater. As a long-time theater worker, in what atmosphere did the Montenegrin production function last year?
The factual matter, which refers to the City Theatre, but also to the general theater in Montenegro, is that production and theatrical creativity are in indirect proportion to the state of society. This is nothing new, it also happened in the nineties during the collapse of a country when Yugoslav theater production was extremely important. This is now happening in Montenegro. Despite all the social, euphemistically called, crises, there was a serious production that someone may like or not, but the fact is that the City Theatre, the Montenegrin National Theater, the Royal Theater Zetski dom, the three pivots of Montenegrin theater creativity, have a serious production with a serious results and, although it may be surprising, but it is in indirect proportion to the general state of society. It is obvious that crises inspire creators, even if those plays used to be escapist and without direct contact with social circumstances, but the fact is that theaters are actually turning into a kind of resistance movement. Theaters have always been movements of resistance against various destructions, stupidities, exclusivities, and even divisions. One of the rare things that we can state that function in society are theaters, regardless of the conditions in which they work, which are far from ideal.
As manager of the City Theatre, what would you point out that marked the previous period?
As for the City Theater specifically, 2022 was exciting and active. The orientation of the theater was, conditionally speaking, on the internationalization of the production in terms of acting. Several times we went beyond the local framework and tried to affirm our work at the regional level. We participated in numerous festivals, guested on invitations, played in addition to competition or revue festivals, which is proof that the theaters and cultural environments of the region recognized the quality of the City Theatre. In addition to the Regional Union of Theaters RUTA Group Triglav, which is a permanent theater carousel that takes place throughout the year, and of which the City Theater is one of the founders, we also participated in one of the most prominent Yugoslav theater festivals "Without Translation" in Užice, with the play " No portfolio" in the direction Branislav Mićunović which towards the end of the year also participated in the highly positioned regional competition festival in Sarajevo, Days of Jurislav Korenić, where it won the Grand Prix of the daily newspaper "Avaz" for the best performance as a whole, and the set designer Marko Petrović Njegoš awarded for the best scenography. Festivals scheduled for 2023 show interest in that play. In addition, the play that came out at the beginning of last year, "The Taming of the Shrew" William Shakespeare directed and adapted Dejan Projkovski she made a success of being a guest at festivals, primarily I mean the Shakespeare Days in Bitol, where she was greeted with a ten-minute applause, and she was also played at the Shakespeare Days in Čortanovci, where she earned reactions from the audience, theater public and critics, which is somewhat unusual for us, because we we almost don't have theater criticism. What I would like to announce exclusively is that "The Taming of the Shrew" will close the theater Olympiad in Budapest in the summer. It is one of the most important European theatrical manifestations in which all European countries participate. It is a manifestation similar to a sports one, but also an opportunity to perform the most significant performances created during a certain period of time in one place.
During the past year, we also worked on a children's production and had two premieres. The play "20.000 miles under the sea" is actually the first premiere and has not been staged in the theater before due to some technical or dramaturgical reasons, but Gradsko staged it, consciously opting for young creators, writers and playwrights. Jasmin Fuluri and the director Marko Cech. The play is a so-called small form in some production expressions, but it is also large in terms of meaning and represents a more alternative view of classical literature and theater. The second play for children belongs to the theatrical mainstream, in the best sense of the word (we tend to use mainstream pejoratively, which is ignorance of the theater). It is "Aladdin's Magic Lamp" in the direction Milan Karadžić which is an absolute hit and for which the seats are always filled to capacity. I must mention that there is a large accumulation of plays for children from earlier years, which have not been performed enough. This is one of the main problems of the City Theatre, because with the redacted dates in KIC "Budo Tomović", until we have our own building, we are forced to redact performances. We expect that during this year, with the entry into the new building, all that we have in the accumulation and which is like a treasure chest, we will get exactly that with the production of the City Theater for Children.
In short, the year passed in the sign of the four aforementioned plays, plays and renewals of old important titles. Here I am referring to the play "Guardians of Your Honesty", which is one of the best we have in the repertoire, and which has been renewed and is actively performed. Because of the corona virus, because of the limited space and schedule, some performances were a little cut short, perhaps neglected, but they are certainly returning to the big stage.
The building would solve many of the problems of the City Theater and this is exactly what has been an inevitable topic for decades. When do you expect to move in?
We devoted the whole of last year, both in terms of staff and technology, to preparations for moving in. The city theater has been strengthened in terms of staff and we are yet to take a big step forward. A distinction must be made between the small shack across the street from the KIC, where Gradsko started more than seven decades ago, and something that is the requirements of a new, modern building. The theater imperatively had to be strengthened from the technical and technological personnel and staff, to the artistic one. Once you enter, and you will enter, a new building, there is a period of adaptation waiting for you. The fact is that the vast majority of works in that building have been completed, and the reasons for the delay in moving in are not my responsibility, but the Agency for Construction and Development of Podgorica and the institutions that did it. In any case, I am sure that this building and this theater will serve the citizens, the city and the country with pride. It is being waited for, and what is being waited for is worth waiting for. Of course, the value is not made by the buildings themselves, but the essence of the people who work there and the repertoire that is played. It should be borne in mind that the construction of a new theater is the cultural and civilizational pride of every country, so the building of the City Theater should be viewed in that context.
The long-awaited building of the Music Center of Montenegro, which turned out to have a number of features, also noticeable to laymen. Can you be sure that it will not be the same with the City Theater building?
As for those fears, they are unnecessary. The big and small stage are functional and will be in full use, we don't have that fear. We will know more about other things related to the infrastructure before entering the building. It is certain that the adaptation will take some time, and that perhaps some shortcomings will be eliminated later, but we will not find ourselves in a situation similar to the one that (was) in the Music Center.
You are the author of the text for the play "Without Portfolio", which was well received by Montenegrin and regional audiences, which once again proves that theater is never local. From the point of view of the writer and manager at the same time, what would you say about this piece and its regional trajectory?
We know that in art the location goes from the individual to the general, so what concerns us today concerns all people in the world. No portfolio deals with the syndrome of authority and as the critic said Bojan Munjin at the Užice festival, it is a play about politics, not a political one. It does not target anyone directly, but deals with the phenomenon of a small man who, when he gets power, enters into some malformations and into something called an unfortunate outcome for both him and the country. All of this is in the wrapper, that is, in the packaging of a comedy, an ironic play or a black comedy, so that some painful truths are easier to swallow and absolve, so that the play is not quite a punch to the head. I always practice that ironic deflection, which is a feature of my handwriting, which helps us to get that poison in a candy wrapper. The fact is that the play "Without Portfolio" marked the season, of course, along with Dejan Projkovski's play, and the fact is that it was a bit of a shock for the cultural public here, and the public in general. Perhaps the City Theater was not expected to engage in something called (social) engagement in this way. That was our intention - not to follow the same trends all the time, because you can't step into the same water twice, but you need to develop and change your repertoire. Of course, that doesn't mean that there won't be such shows in the future, but it also doesn't mean that we will strictly insist on it. As a writer, the success of the play, of course, pleases me. It has nothing to do with managing, because you are a manager for a term, and a writer for life, and that is my main occupation and life commitment. Just as failures, which are inevitable, hurt, so do successes.
You touch on politics, so how much does the City Theater depend on the political scene and setting in Podgorica, given that it is an institution whose founder is the capital?
Our task is to do our job, not to make state policy, but to make plays. Probably, in the coming period, this repertoire and everything we do and intend to do will be viewed through some new filters, but there is a poetic argument for all that. Doubt is a constant and it's up to a person to doubt, but our repertoire is relevant, as evidenced by numerous guest appearances so far, as well as those that are planned, as well as the maintenance of the high rating of RUTA groups of the Triglav festival. It is up to us to do our job regardless of social or political circumstances. Certainly, as I said before, the quality of theatrical production has been shown to be inversely proportional to social circumstances.
However, with the political changes, we are witnessing a richer production of some theater companies, and on the other hand, we have also witnessed the influence of political structures on the cancellation of some performances. How much do culture and politics correspond in general?
Culture becomes important when it comes to the incident zone. When an incident happens, then everyone gets hold of the culture and starts various discussions with the guardians, attackers, defenders, orthodox believers, heretics, and in all this the theatrical act is not allowed to defend or destroy itself. Theater always proves itself, not politics. We had reactions to the play "Without a portfolio" from all political options, both affirmative and reproachful, and in cross-border reading it proved to be current, so at the Užice festival we had a couple of people from the high establishment who left the play. That it concerns us and that it is not exclusively coniferous, although it arose from our environment and mentality, but also that it is successful, shows exactly that. Certainly, we did not encounter either drastic bans or rigid reactions, probably because some degree of democracy was still achieved. The theater can be an occasion for the creation of incidents that are mostly outside the theater, and which are sometimes to the detriment of the theater or to its benefit, when something that otherwise would have been missed is actualized.
We are entering the third decade of the 21st century. In addition to the plans for 2023 that you have somewhat announced, what would you say are the challenges and needs of the theater today?
First of all, it is impossible to destroy the theater, no matter what. It lasts and it is the world's longest-lived cultural institution, civilizational, sociological, political... It is older than religion, than Christianity, it is older than the form of the state that we know and it is the longest-lived. Obviously, theater belongs to the ontological need of man to express himself in this way, and it is certain that he experiences transformations and changes. What is characteristic of the time you are talking about is that there is no common poetic denominator of theatrical life and expression. We are in that definition of the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the era Mao Zedong, "Let a thousand flowers bloom", and the theater is on that background - all genres and expressions are represented in parallel. This is where the polarization of artists is created on the topic of what is more important, and everything is equally important, if you have creative arguments to communicate some poetic and life truths. The fact is that various trends have emerged, but my professor Jovan Hristić he used to say that nothing gets out of date faster than a trend. At the moment, all forms of theater exist in parallel, they are looking for their audience and the echoes of the cultural public, if, I say, the theater scene definitely takes shape, and I don't mean only Podgorica, Montenegro and the region, because it seems to me that Europe has taken a few steps back somewhere , and it's up to us to trot after her.
Entered the first line-up of the ex-YU theater scene
The path established by the RUTA festival attracts numerous visitors and theater fans eager to get to know the expressions of the neighborhood. How much did it contribute to the City Theatre?
On the one hand, RUTA removed the boundaries, which is the merit of the artistic director's initiative Dusan Kovačević who gave the maximum contribution to it, and on the other hand, if there was no quality production, there would be none, because the performances that are played are really relevant. Sometimes we tend to have a small environment syndrome or inferiority complex without needing to. Breaking that was one of my tasks during the current part of the mandate, and it will be in the future. When it comes to guest appearances by the City Theatre, I must point out that the artistic director of Kovačević, who initiates initiatives and has ambitions of this kind, made a big and significant contribution. It turned out that at all the festivals we were side by side with the majors of the ex-Yu theater scene, with the Yugoslav Drama and Folk Theaters, Gavel, Rijeka Theater, Slovenian Theater in Ljubljana, that is, with all those theaters that had a high status before. . Gradsko stood by their shoulder and entered the circle of the first line-up of ex-Yugoslav theater life.
Deviation of the environment towards authentic domestic creators
Last year, you hired domestic directors, both young and established ones. What are the plans for the future?
The problem of this environment is that we don't know how to appreciate our own or for some other reason we have deviations or guards towards directors who are from here and who represent an authentic Montenegrin product and think in a way that was formed in this cultural environment. The fact is that we are turning to the younger generation of Montenegrin directors, in addition to the fact that there is a shortage of this staff in our country. This is a question of the Faculty of Dramatic Arts, but also of small productions, conditionally speaking, within which directors can assert themselves after graduation. We will try to return the Montenegrin directing staff to the big stage, but also to have the classics in a new vision on the one hand, and at the same time to insist on (young) domestic authors.
Lidija Dedović directs the play "Samo nek je po redu" by a Montenegrin playwright Stefan Bošković. For the children's scene, it is planned to Zoran Rakočević is doing "Sleeping Beauty", something that is relatively mainstream, but knowing Rakočević, poetic shifts are also possible. We are also planning the text "Neda" Dragan Tripković, which in a strange and intriguing way deals with historical times and the period of Duklja. It is our duty to deal with local writers and directors.
Co-production projects are planned for 2023. Bobo Jelčić will direct a co-production with the Serbian National Theater from Novi Sad, a piece with the working title "Where we were and where we are now". There is also "Decameron" Giovanni Bocač, directed by Dejan Projkovski... On a conditional repertoire plan (because everything depends on the budget, circumstances and the like), a project is planned under the working title "The Story of Antun", a co-production with Grad Teatr Budva, directed by Vide Ognjenović. In addition to "Sleeping Beauty", the children's stage is also planned to stage "Tarzan", a play that combines puppetry with choreo-drama. One of the directors is Davor Dragojevic, and someone who deals with stage movement and choreography will be engaged at the same time. We are planning that for the new scene, which we hope.
Bonus video:
