Sándor Zsótér does not even try to organise a group of actors into the more than half hundred forced changings of set. He puts on stage the essence of Musset’s extremely long, almost un-performable confused play with Júlia Ungár’s re-translation.

Of course for it he needs an almost unique, capable troupe too, Maladype that has passed exams excellently for many times. Lorenzaccio is a very big bite in this adaptation, especially that the actors, except for one, perform four, multi faced characters. Because of this, those viewers, who do not know the story of the play and its characters have to concentrate hard at the beginning with the crackling of veins of brain not to lose the line of it. But after a certain point, if they can stand it that far, it is for sure, that they can understand that the young Lorenzo would overthrow the cruel tyrant, but while he can hardly stand the battle with his ingratiating mask, he loses the fight against the hypocritical, manipulating and cunning people around him. It turns out, that Caterina, who knows well about her moral, can be seduced anyway, that cardinal Cibo, as a confessor is hunting for information for his promotion, and Lorenzo can win finally for nothing, the council will choose a puppet for the new ruler after the tyrant.

They have not cared about the useless changings of set, and the space is so tensely intimate and narrow, that those, who perform in it, would take the last drops of oxygen from each other during the one and half an hour. The new place is marked by an actor’s dispassionately intimate statement, but soon the place can be imagined around the characters, because all characters till the end overworked, sometimes caricature-like in an over-drawn way, but they always define the place around them. Ádám Tompa as Alessandro, he is nicely naughty, and lazy carelessness and cruelty shine only in the edge of his eyes. In the role of Cibo, as the cardinal, he is honeyed, whom we would like to punch on face. Zoltán Lendváczky is brilliant in the female roles. He is on the very edge of parody, but he can always keep the credibility in the role of the tempting marchioness Cibo or the moral Caterina. Zsolt Páll is firm, he performs obvious roles, he does not miss, the stress does not slide, and there are not any inappropriate grimaces. Kamilla Fátyol’s presence is imposing, ironic and womanish in a demonic way at the same time. Ákos Orosz, in the role of Lorenzo gets almost as hard exercise as his partners. However, he performs one role, his struggle is so colourful, that he looks at us with a different face, in each moment. Once he is pathetic whiny one, then he is firm and raspy, then he is ready to collapse, but in the end he is a hero, who gets back his mood to fight. He certifies Lorenzo with his thousand different looks, who during the fulfilment of his heroic act does not know, that the face that is looking at him is a mask or the one that is under it.

Besides the humour, which is presented strongly all through the performance, in a fine and popular form too, neither the multi-faced hero’s tragedy nor the critic of the turncoat humanity fade away. Meanwhile everything is covered by the red gloves. These many bloody hands are almost stifling. The costumes disturb the eyes, in the annoyingly varying shades of red. Then from that huge pile of red gloves, suddenly a giant puppet is formed, which questions the importance of everything. The commercial brown-noising for power get its full form with an easy but even more appropriate joke over the searching for the truth. This impressive teamwork is more than actual.

Krisztina Szepesi, Pesti Műsor, 2009

(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)