The three performances of Timofey Kulyabin’s play “In the Solitude of the Cotton Fields” by Bernard-Marie Coltes with the world-famous John Malkovich and Ingeborga Dapkunaite are now history. This time, not a single journalist and few of the writing brothers were accredited by the “Ivan Vazov” National Theater were lucky enough to see the two great actors perform live on our academic stage. That’s why we share the impressions of actors and directors from the class, determined to compare their watch with a model of the world theater, for the less than an hour long performance and the atmosphere in the hall.
Actress Nona Yotova wrote: “The performance is stunning. The set design combines minimalism and scale, through a clean set and close-up of the performers, filmed by cameras and broadcast directly on a big screen. A front camera game that captures even the smallest detail, like lipstick or a razor. The music and the picture on the screen in the short interludes immediately sent me to Tarkovsky’s “Sacrifice”…
And more: “Terrifying acting. Both of them, exceptional artists, play at 200%. The direction is very expressive, emotional, requiring this giving of the artist. You see the world famous Malkovich jumping, crying, rolling around the stage, monkeying around eating candy, in close-up on the screen. Dapkunaite is lovely, fragile and strong, extremely talented, ironic, plastic and fascinating”.
The director and playwright Yordan Slaveykov (“The Spider”, “Victoria”) shares: “The action of this performance happened not so much on the stage as in my mind, soul and heart, in my body… And I supposedly know “for what, in the name of what was all that”, I say it and start to doubt. Is it this, is it only this, and is it not, on the contrary, something else entirely. Is the meaning so obvious? If so, why haven’t I noticed it until now, or maybe I’ve been pretending not to notice it. Is the play about how love between two invariably turns into war?… Or about something more terrifying: about how and why we kill God/the divine spark within us? And is it possible? Is it about the fall of man, about the breakdown of faith? If so – where is Dostoyevsky here with his “and then I worshiped his great human suffering?” When did we become fratricide/murderers?” Slaveykov is painfully frank.
“Dapkunaite is a magnificent actress. Malkovich too. Kulyabin has found how to mathematically calculate everything on the stage – both the visible and the invisible. Skipping the single-sex/gay narrative of the lyrics is a huge plus. This is a text about the man, not about who he sleeps with,” the Bulgarian director is emphatic. And he throws in a curious idea: “While I was watching, I thought how among the Bulgarian actresses Koina Ruseva could play any of the two roles, because she has a very strong, very powerful inner “drive” and because she knows how to contain it, not to manifest it “…
Actress Liliana Shomova, winner of 2 “Askeer” awards for supporting role (2015, 2022) writes: “It was an exciting evening, really meaningful! I dream of one day participating in such a performance, and in the meantime, I will try to move forward in achieving brilliant diction, ease of movement, of communication, as if nothing costs them, but what a crushing text, in fact…” . And he quotes several lines from the play, giving an idea of the mysterious, allegorical text on which it is built:
“Dealer: Excuse me, are you sure that in the noise of the night you didn’t say exactly what you wanted from me, and I didn’t hear you?
Customer: No, I didn’t say anything. I did not say anything. And you, are you sure that in this night, in the midst of this darkness so deep that one can hardly get used to it, you did not offer me anything, and I did not guess what it was?
Dealer: Nothing.
Customer: So, what’s the weapon?”…
The journalist Petar Punchev, who entitled his post “Eyes full, head – empty”, is not so enthusiastic and generous with praise. He is delighted with the stage realization, but has reservations about the play itself. “According to the critics, this play – ‘In the Solitude of the Cotton Fields’ is considered the greatest challenge for the directors. It is definitely so, and this means that the Russian director Kulyabin has done brilliantly. Class multimedia performance, modern, clean, beautiful. A joy to the eye. Two recognized acting names and quite a super-professional crew gave their all to play the Absolute Nothing. I have probably never seen a more empty and desolate text on stage,” he lamented.
CORRECTIVE
For those connoisseurs of the theater who remained outside the salon without the opportunity to see for themselves the consistency of the artistic fact presented by the production team, the hope remains that John Malkovich will visit again. Before the opening in “Kvadrat 500” of the exhibition dedicated to the great American actor, the Acting Minister of Culture Nayden Todorov invited Malkovich to be a guest at the “Bulgaria” hall with another project of his – “The Music Critic”, in which a chamber orchestra with a soloist violinist also participated Julian Rachlin. Malkovich responded that he would be happy to come because he loves this project, the “Slaveykov Square” website reported.
In the only interview that the star of “Dangerous Liaisons” gave on Bulgarian soil – in front of the new Artportal culture platform, it is about his possible guest appearance in the summer at the International Theater Festival “Varna Summer” with the play “Devilish Comedy – Confessions of a Murderer” . The negotiations for the visit were at an advanced stage and a contract was to be signed. The director of the National Theater, Vasil Vassilev, also told “Sega” that negotiations are underway for Malkovich’s next guest appearance.
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