ANNA KARENINA

Dramatization based on the novel by Leo Tolstoy

Translation from German Jelena Kostic Tomovic

 

Director Jug Radivojevic

Set Designer Aleksandar Denic

Costume Designer Momirka Bailovic

Stage Speech Radovan Knezevic

Lighting Design Srdjan Jovanovic

Associate Psychiatrist - psychoanalyst Dr. Srdja Zlopasa

Assistant Director Masa Radovic

Music selection Jug Radivojevic

Assistant Costume Designer Aleksandar Kovacevic

 

CHARACTERS

 

ANNA KARENINA..............................Nina Jankovic

KARENIN..........................................Tihomir Stanic

STEPAN............................................Aleksandar Radojicic

DASHA.............................................Milena Vasic

KITTY...............................................Tamara Aleksic

LEVIN...............................................Igor Djordjevic

VRONSKY.........................................Viktor Savic

 

“Anna Karenina” in the opera and theatre “Madlenianum” is the project that firmly establishes the repertoire orientation towards titles which represent the most artistic merits and thus the famous and worshiped novel of Leo Tolstoy on the stage crowns the several years created path that the house has been following since its drama stage setting up. The title, which has not been on Belgrade theatre repertoire for more decades, will be presented on stage throughout a very exciting and worldwide level confirmed quality dramatization of the German playwright Armin Petras.  

Jug Radivojevic as the director of this play (that is his jubilee hundredth theatre direction) will tell us “a sad love story, the most tragic due to the cognition of a seemingly ideal love loss and sacrifice futility”. In his drama Armin Pertas has decided on seven characters and according to director, each of these characters has their own specific way they pass through this eternally popular story. “For Anna perhaps the most important question is life concept. For Karenin that is a semblance (form is more important than substance), for Vronsky a passion, for Dasha religion, for Kitty the search for identity and for Levin- establishment of a patriarchal system.  Today, first of all, we can identify with the main character. What happens when we leave a certain defined life concept and then a new one (the one we left the old for) goes wrong? The question of life concept is as well the question of the concept of one city, state, which should give birth freedom without any tragic consequences”.

The actors of the exceptionally attractive and hard roles will be Nina Jankovic as Anna Karenina, Tihomir Stanic as Karenin, Viktor Savic as Vronsky, Igor Djordjevic as Levin, Milena Vasic as Dasha, Tamara Aleksic as Kitty and Aleksandar Radojcic as Stepan. The author of scenography is Aleksandar Denic, while Momirka Bailovic is a Costume Designer.

 

Direcor Jug Radivojevic:

Concepts of Anna Karenina…

The defeat of Tolstoy’s heroine is not a condemnation of society, her defeat is a loss of the concept and faith in love…

For Anna the most important issue is the question of life concept, for Karenin the form is the most important one, semblance, passion is for Vronsky, decadence for Stepan,   religion for Dasha, the identity search for Kitty, patriarchal system establishment for Levin…

Today, first of all, we can identify with the main heroine. What happens when we leave a certain defined life concept and then a new one, the one we left the old for, goes wrong? “Anna Karenina” is a story where one society is replaced by another, after   Tsarist Russia, the October Revolution comes. I will try to bring closer that story to a nowadays viewer, by setting it in the time between Gorbachev and Yeltsin. An undefined system. The question of life concept is as well a question of one city, state…   

The love of Ana and Vronsky is primary a question of courage. Love that puts nothing on a beam scale is in the best romantic sense a kind of fervor. But that is also the story of the time past, present and future. Time succeeds to devalue that love, willingness to sacrifice all for it, leaving the painful consequences to themselves and to their close ones. That is how the life concept decays as well. Passion passes and life banalities go onto the surface, romance is replaced by dry realism, Ana becomes jealous and hysterical and Vronsky gets disinterested… 

This is a sad love story, the most tragic due to the cognition of a seemingly ideal love loss and sacrifice futility.