INTERVIEW - DEJAN MIJAC, DIRECTOR
Defense against time
"At this moment, like never before in the history of Serbia, we are faced with the decision of whether we will collectively kill ourselves or not"
Six plays directed by Dejan Mijač are currently playing in the repertoire of Belgrade theaters. They are in Atelier 212 Leda, Miracle u Shargan, Wild w/ i America Second deo, and in the Yugoslav Drama Patriots and, more recently, Canine waltz Leonid Andreyeva. Immediately after the latest premiere, Dejan Mijač started rehearsing Shakespeare Epiphany night in the National Theater. In the biography of Dejan Mijač, among other things, it is written that he was born in 1934, that he is one of the cornerstones of contemporary Yugoslav theater, that he directed classic and contemporary works on all the important stages of this region, that he taught acting and directing, that he received many awards , and to successfully communicate with the audience beyond the mundane commercialization and daily engagements.
"WEATHER": your performances, kako se to popular he says, they correspond sa to some current social problems. What je incentive za Canine waltz?
LEAVE WASHER: That's a big question because we don't all experience our time in the same way. For example, the time of bloodshed that we recently went through was experienced by some as euphoric, as some patriotic ecstasy, for some it was the happiest days of their lives. And I, on the contrary, was affected. Therefore, the question is how this time is experienced. That is perhaps the reason for making a play and defense from that time... Searching for your citadel, a safe place from where you can think about things more important than the everyday.
Da li th maybe thought o feeling loneliness i unfulfilled who dominates a performance, i who je easy find i u life everyone od nose? Da li his performances you are looking for answers i na personal doubts?
Probably yes. I can't talk about it... It's something that moves me...
Sometimes it is important to sharpen an attitude as much as possible, an attitude that is otherwise clear, to insist on clarity, in order to see something that is obvious. Because it's obviously the hardest to see. If something is obvious, it does not mean that it has been seen and received. Today, an image is projected of a happy society where everyone should be satisfied. All these things around us that circulate as a scourge of daily politics are actually promises of that kind. But the game of those happy people is transparent. Because the more one insists on that collectivist utopianism, the lonelier a person is. People are afraid for their existence and cannot solve the question of their loneliness, they do not admit it. And somewhere there is the reason for many evils. That is easily manipulated, that fear of being alone. At the end Dog waltz the main character kills himself, which of course is not the solution. At this moment, like never before in the history of Serbia, we are faced with the decision of whether we will collectively kill ourselves or not. Many run away, they will not decide, because it is not a pleasant decision, and it has to be made. And there is that moment of existential anxiety and discomfort. Unfortunately, in recent times we have chosen the option of walking the line that favors one's get-rich-quick. Those who might recognize it, the ordinary world, which is responsible for the choice, has no answer. And then fear arises, fear of action. And that's the same fear that exists in this piece.
Leonid Andreev, a i vi, ironically you speak o Russia melancholy i o empty patriotism pa bi se could say da se u tome segment Canine waltz continues na yours the previous one the play, na Sterile Patriots.
When you watch matches at the European Football Championship, and you see, for example, Danes or Swedes singing national anthems, you think that they are no less patriotic than Serbs. It's just that they can sing the anthem because they have one. And we can't even express ourselves in basic attributes, we just beat ourselves up saying that we have something that no one else has. We are not at that championship either. And what else is there to talk about. Sing your song, let me see you, beat someone, prove that you are special!
U present th used nine technological opportunities what the majority yours kolega avoids. Da li mi Sami sebe we limit?
It is, and it's very simple. There are devices, you need to know how to use them, I discovered people who know it (Boris Miljković's team, well), and that gives me hope that the Yugoslav Drama Theater is not equipped at the European level for nothing, nor that it has all the conditions and devices. I didn't use even one percent of those opportunities. In the play, the door opens and closes by itself because it says so in the text, is that a problem? No, you just need to press the button. It's a trick, a very simple trick.
Considers se da th setting Nusic's The open seas explained what u practice means syntagma "classic na contemporary the way". How bis je defithey didn't?
For example, you are reading new novels, but you are intrigued Steering i chrism. And you don't mind that you learn about, for example, Napoleon, who feels normal among the other characters. This gives me the right to see the epoch as some small miracle-working stone that gives us the initial defamiliarization that makes us shift into another reality. Now, how to put that era on stage depends on the play. Sometimes it is important to see the topic in an archaic example, so that it is commented on from a contemporary point of view, and sometimes it is important to reach for some kind of alchemy that the past provides.
America Second deo Herbs Srbljanović je deviation od your attitude da you respect contemporary young writers, ali however you direct share classic ones.
Well, Biljana is a classic, a modern classic. It is an encyclopedic unit, it is not something unknown nor is it a disco novelty. It has its proven and established value.
How show love na scene? U Lady su don't od the most beautiful of love scene seen u ours theaters.
The devil will know him! I'm really working now Epiphany night in which the theme is love, love as a search for identity, the heroes don't know who they are or what they are, they don't even know what gender they are. Shakespeare then leads to the knowledge that one should actually love in oneself what could appear as an object of love. It is not difficult to awaken love as an emotion in an actor, it is difficult to get him interested in coming to a confessional moment and acting out what he really knows and feels about love. We all hide, we are ashamed of it, we are quite vulnerable, but it has to be done. And when it succeeds, it's very nice. And the viewers feel that magic.
The last ones years theaters su satisfied number visitors although se knows da taj number it is not a large. Da li se, because conditions u kojima we live, should team satisfy?
We are poor, there is a lot of misery, unbearable. But at the same time, we must not forget that we live on the European continent. Although there is such a beautiful public institution as JDP, whose advantage is that everyone can enter it, some people do not come to the theater, not because they do not have money for a ticket, the ticket is hell and a cigar, but because they do not need to come in. They are amazed by the fact that there is someone who is engaged in what, according to them, is badavajisan. However, there are also those who need theater, good music, reading, who cannot live without it. They are in the vast minority. Now this does not mean that you create the conditions that satisfy that elite minority, no, you create the conditions for the wider population to become an elite minority. And whoever does not see that, is a serious fool.
Da li je commercialization put ka tome to the goal?
It is a great stunt to make a play that the audience will accept. Or an export performance. The first requirement in both variants is to make a good show. It doesn't work without that. Especially today, when the audience is no longer just interested in entertainment, when they are looking for quality. And I also worked in theaters that have so-called commercial performances, I worked in Kult. I remember, it fed us with bread. Batrić Žarković, the man who leads Slavija, is a very brave man, he works for profit, and that is very difficult. Whoever decides to build a theater, to invest money, and to live from the theater, it is a very thankless job.
Da li se something changed na RTS u od Kada some President theirs Administrative odor?
I have no idea. I neither inquire nor look at what, I assume, is their pride and main flagship - Dnevnik. I'm not interested in that. I always said "let's make our own television". Even the late Zoran Djindjic asked me what it was. It's the television from my youth, when we used to say "let's pass this Dnevnik thing so we can watch television". That's right. And now they think that the main reason for the existence of the national television is Dnevnik, and everything else in the program goes like crazy.
Da li u trial Legion or u pre-election campaigns you find theatrical elements?
No, those are some other areas. It is very wrong to compare theatrical gestures and what is pejoratively considered directing with theater. For me, theater is a search for truth, and politics is the opposite of that. Politics is how to arrange and caress. So much for that.
Realization yours creativity i rada it depends i od money, which one does not have. How se you are coming?
Not at all. Theater was invented not to make money but to spend money, theater is a parasitic thing. I personally and all of us who work in the theater have chosen to be poor. In whatever system I lived and worked, I cannot be the main rich man. But there is something in the theater that is a spiritual superstructure of something that is a material part of life, which makes it worthwhile to do that unprofitable thing. The funniest thing to me is when I hear that there is a game in the theater. Hunting and power! What a black hunt! I wonder what kind of powerful man I am when I ride public transport and have never paid income tax in my life, and I would like that moment to come. Every year, I regularly take all the papers to the municipality, but I always hear "I'm sorry, Mr. Mijač, you're not a taxpayer this time either." I'm not whining or cursing fate, I have to survive, I'm not in poverty, I'm retired, and I work a lot. I'm used to having no needs: I'm not intrigued by new cars, and I see vacationing as an obligation to rest a little so that I can return to my new job as soon as possible.
A long time ago acquired brand "Washer" you adjust new valuable criteria i tako ga you do Always new.
You know what, it is very important to reach the moment, and I really have, when I am no longer obliged to present myself to others as someone who needs to surprise. As much as I can do at that moment, sometimes worse sometimes worse. And I'm really casual about it. I know what I just said may sound overbearing, like I don't really care what others think. But it didn't. After all, I work for the audience, for the public, and I really care about people accepting me, understanding me, loving me and appreciating me. But I'm not in a spasm - succeed or fail. And in order to get there, you have to live and endure.
Sonja Ciric, VREME No. 703, June 24, 2004.
