DOLCE VITA

Premiere: 07.12.2018
Small Stage of the Madlenianum

The text Dolce Vita by Jelena Paligoric Sinkevic has been chosen at the Young Theatre Playwright Contest with a romantic comedy as the given genre. Besides the text, Jelena has also gathered the author team (currently the youngest one in Belgrade theatres): Jug Djordjevic, director, Ivana Jelic, set designer, Lara Popovic, costume designer, Anka Gacesa Kostic, choreographer and Andrej Sinkevic, composer, having written an emotional story for a great troupe of actors consisting of: Snezana Jeremic Neskovic, Ljiljana Stjepanovic, Anka Gacesa Kostic, Tamara Aleksic, Branislav Zeremski and Minja Subota, as a good ghost of a play and the curiosity is that Branka Veselinovic appears as Granny Dara.
The young playwright has created the romantic drama intended for her generation, but also for the generation of her parents and their parents as well. The team of Dolce Vita play reminds the audience about the spirit of Belgrade that has been unstoppably passed down from generation to generation and although at first glance seemingly put aside from the central city events, it makes the heart of Belgrade beats with generosity, warmth, sincere communion and tenderness. Madlenianum has crystalized that in this very moment their audience should be nourished with the emotions that bring optimism and loving life.   

“I was writing the romantic comedy with songs, Dolce Vita, when my son was nine months old, being totally convinced that it is possible to make a micro world that exists independently of the world which is, to say the least, cruel. We were living in Prague and I used to walk across Wenceslas Square on my way to the language school. Whenever I asked myself what I was missing, there was just one answer- the scent of chestnut puree. Writing this play, I envisaged a place in the theatre with people leading ordinary lives as the characters in the limelight, but yet not marginal. They are happy in their day and their troubles, although silenced, are existent. They live even though nobody notices them”, says the writer and adds “I believe that the only way to keep common sense is to create your own micro world. Also, when creating something ours, both in life and the theatre, we are making this world a better place to live in. My choice was to give voice to people we pass by every day, we lough at, but they do not have enough space. Dolce Vita is a story of surviving in the world which systematically does not recognize any kind of tenderness."   

Dolce Vita is a play:

About the happy past,

About things that disappear and come,

About family secrets,

About the missing recipe,

About solitude,

About the new age generation,

About loving Belgrade,

About the adventures we are still not ready for,

About falling in love that knows no time,

About cakes, sweets and cookies…

It is said that the recipe for sweet life is like a recipe for the perfect cake! If that is true and if we find that perfect recipe for sweet life, what happens when the recipe is lost?! The play Dolce Vita is literally trying to figure and comprehend the above asked question. Namely, in one Belgrade confectionary with a huge tradition we find two generations of women, the owners of the confectionary, struggling to be in and keep up with the present moment. A visit of an unexpected guest “threatens” to save the confectionary. But the visitor does not come empty-handed. She brings a big family mystery in the form of the perfect life recipe with her. Will our heroines manage to figure out that mystery and save their heritage from oblivion?

This romantic comedy is dedicated to women’s friendships. The four women, who are in the focus of the story, made a fairy tale of their everyday life. In our story, love occurs between the oldest characters, the ones already in their third age. In the world of youth terror and years, in the speed of everyday life, Jelena Paligoric Sinkevic has made a story of friendship and love. Music is an important aspect of the story.  "It is a quote on schlagers, on the time when music was being listened to and not looked at”, says Jelena. The play Dolce Vita is not about romanticizing the past, but the attempt to take the best out of everything that has passed and to live in the present moment.