Last week I wrote about The Misanthrope performance in József Katona Theatre that in the end Alceste does not take with himself any books to the fake emigration. I have been warned that I saw it badly. He takes it. With a bag. I apologise for it. Ernő Fekete was packing almost from the beginning, I did not notice the books, and I thought – I wanted to – that if he left the world, he left also the culture, as the stupid ones had grabbed it too. Anyway, his own culture, a person would take with himself also into the exile. In the books. Or in his head.

As well as Figaro does it. Figaro as an educated one is a mental emigrant too. As he told it in his famous monologue, he had to finish play writing, newspaper publishing, as he annoyed powerful people, who punished him, censored him, and make him impossible. Figaro is like an Alceste from the drawer, who has been censored and ostracised, he has to leave the mental life behind, and return to his original profession, to the shaving brush. Some years after the writing of the play, some people, who are similarly to Figaro, were silenced, got the guillotine called governmental shavers, which can cut the noble censors’ necks, but it is another story, and it is not for sure, that Figaro will be among the punishers. The people of mental would live with the weapon of critic rather than with the critic of the weapons. (As István Vas mentioned it in his work, Three Nights of one Love, half a century ago.)

The wit, this weapon of critic, which is ready to die out, can be one of the virtues of the play, of Figaro’s Marriage by Beaumarchais, which the Maladype Theatre performs with Sándor Zsótér’s staging. The director believes in the power of words so much – on the base of the theatre, where civilian rooms open one from another, there is not any other possibilities – that he empties the place, or he sets it with us, with the viewers. He surrounds the place with the lines of the dialogues, which are fast and ruled by movements many times. The civilian flat is suitable for a civilian comedy. We are close to one another, the designer, Mária Ambrus takes good care of the fact that the actors can hardly move between and behind us, and they can crouch down behind us if they have to hide, or they can use the double doors for hiding themselves. Our imagination can also play – we help the actors with it – for example, Zénó Faragó’s Cherubin does not have to jump into the street, as his text would need it (we are frightened for a moment, when he opens the window above), it is enough if we believe, that he would jump out. The night garden of the last act can change the clear and balanced lighting – the switches can be used even before – as much that from then neon lights, running around, can give blunt, bluish light. But there are not any places to hide, they may go to the other room, and the door can be closed. But which is the right or the left door according to the text (“arbour”) can depend on the fact, that Kamilla Fátyol’s Fanchette stands with her back to the window or to the wall, and that tiny moment, while she decides it, can be connected to the wit of the performance. The chaos of the garden scene can get as clean and smooth mental lighting as the room. They do not have to imitate a half-shadow, covered faces, easily exchanging figures – we are similar in body shape, says the Countess (or Suzanne), but seemingly it is not true – the optical disappointment is ruled by the inner view, the desire, the jealousy, the originally formed assumptions can make the character blind. The guarantee of their credibility is their connection with their contents, not their outside compliance.

Mari Benedek dresses them as historical hybrids, there are half-long or ground long, white formal “costumes” with or without straps, with slippers, high-heels or trainers, there are striped Sunday suits for the dudes for the streets, silk shirts, which are patterned on its own, black old lady dresses, lazy jackets. These clothes are misfit, there are half ready sets, from the dress hirer to a party, and from the second hand shop to the formal occasion. Who wears them “are not from that time”, but they give themselves: they are playful, who take the style, the passed souls of the passed time, the trickery and elegance of situations, which cannot be imitated today, the elegance of speech and deviousness in a way, the laziness of reactions. (Those, who have an opera-ear, can hear all through the performance Da Ponte and Mozart’s masterpieces, which were composed, with consensual brilliant loyalty, which can create an even higher level of quality.) All of it cannot happen without Júlia Ungár, who serves the material of the feat, and its text: she uses the modern language, which cuts the useless extras and avoids the dessert of contemporary flatness.

We can hardly recognise the troupe of Maladype, as they are not the same actors, who did the previous performance. They do not do anything special, and they do not serve elevated quality, but they fulfil crystal clean analysis, all the characters have been thought over, the relationships are clear, the situations are punctual, the play is lighted through the light and playfulness fills it. Ákos Orosz’s Figaro is a little bit cheeky buffo like, he is naïve and open, he would like to choose the straight way, if his life did not force him on tricks. Erika Tankó is resourceful, she is a realistic Suzanne, and she probable finds herself better in the everyday world, than her partner does. Judit Kovács Ligeti’s resigned Countess has grown of the girlish dreams, she listens with almost maternal smile, which is covered by clouds, to Zénó Faragó’s lanky Cherubin’s amusement with turns into teenager-like falsetto. The Count, as Ádám Tompa performs him, has not gained yet enough male vanity for his captivating poses and that lazy mood, which can compensate his failures. Kamilla Fátyol’s chit Fanchette is most be the most mature one in archness, she is the cleverest one, and the least scrupulous among the other characters of the play. Zsolt Páll gives the sense of dignity to Bartholo, the doctor, who is pushed into the background. Zoltán Ledvánczky goes around, and then sometimes he comes back from the other room with a characteristically different figure. The funny laziness, jokes of words and playful ideas work well too: as the empty room is the place, then the properties are found objects, the letters are advertisement notes, the Countess’ ribbon – physical fetish for Cherubin – is a bra, which is left there. In spite of that last one, there is not eroticism in the performance – this is the only thing, which is missing.

Mari Törőcsik performs Marceline, the devoted mother, who she becomes from the marriage blackmailer, old woman. We could think that she overturns the balance of the performance, and it is true. But in a good way. It is not enough, that she is another quality, she is an extraordinary quality: she performs with great emotional amplitude, she uses sharp changes of voice and mood, on many registers and in pianos too, she frees up extreme energies (as she has told in an interview recently: she learnt it from Konsky, from the Russian director). All moments of it is from high levelled school, after a rude and husky snort she become softer, after the loud outbreak she becomes nicer, she looks above his son’s head, who leans to her breast with triumphant smile. After her defence argument on behalf of female gender, we can feel the silence of choking tense in the room instead of the moved feelings. Anyway, all of it cannot disrupt the performance, in contrast to it, it can offer high level points, express rays from above, creates a magnetic field, everybody is got into its catchment area. It is a school for actors and viewers too, it is the classroom of civilian flat, it can become a workshop and theatre of pleasure. We should appreciate it.

Maybe, after a while real theatre can be made only in flats, from their own power.

Tamás Koltai, Élet és Irodalom, 2011

(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)