Putting Pasolini On Stage – Jarzyna Deserves Praise
Anna R. Burzyńska, TYGODNIK POWSZECHNY
Almost ten years ago on the very same stage of TR Warszawa in one of his best performances “The Maenads" based on Euripides Krzysztof Warlikowski posed questions regarding the relations between man and the sacrum. The relation which is tough, violent and tragic. Dionysius coming from beyond the margins of the society meets a rationalist Pentheus. Who is this god? Is he a liberator, a seducer or a murderer? Pentheus and Dionysius are intertwined by an invisible relationship, like reflections in the mirror, like a couple of two look-alikes so similar that it is impossible to decide which one is the creator and which one is his creation. Dionysius walks across the world like the plague killing the unfaithful and empowering those who trusted him.
God or Devil?
Things are similar in "Teoremat" , however much more drastic; definitely not due to the shocking moral aspect. The nameless Visitor who calls at the villa of a rich industrialist, has irresistible erotic power and one by one he seduces all the inhabitants of the villa from the god-fearing old servant, to the frustrated teenage children and the beautiful and neglected wife of the workaholic husband and even the husband himself. Whatever the Visitor does, he does it disinterestedly and without any ill intentions. On the contrary, he makes the puppet-like, unhappy and burnt-out family members come back to life, they bloom and shine. One morning everything changes when the Visitor leaves as unexpectedly as he arrived…
Dionysius? A sacral prostitute? Perhaps a prehistoric god of fertility? Pasolini spoke very cautiously about the archaic, original religiousness yet the Christian, or even Catholic dimension cannot be neglected here. It is visible on the level of symbolic situations, metaphors and, last but not least, the language which is mystical and by means of shockingly sensual and pungent imagery expresses the closeness of God and man. Together with the Christian model of the world a clear dialectics of good and evil appears and the question on the Visitor’s identity is transferred onto a different level: is that a particular and blasphemous image of God or is that Satan?
Grzegorz Jarzyna does not provide an unambiguous answer, which is very good. He shows how the enigmatic Visitor, like a wonder maker or rather a seasoned psychoanalyst comes to understanding with each of the characters. Through the body he reaches not only their complexes and problems but their consciousness and the fundaments of their identity. In the first part of the play Jarzyna shows this in a very consistent manner.
The life in the villa reminds of a music box where the lifeless figurines move automatically to mechanical music; three time we can see all the members of family repeat the unhurried morning rites of brushing their hair, preparing for work, sitting at the breakfast table. Always the same, the same seats, the same order – what is only changed is the color of dresses and sweaters. The Visitor (Sebastian Pawlak) brings real life to this theater. Physicality is its most important manifestation and means of expression, but not the only one. For there is still something like humor which has so far been absent, there is the opening to the surrounding world, there is the opening to the irrational dimension, to the sacrum.
Expelled from Paradise
Jarzyna follows Pasolini’s film very faithfully; the sequence of scenes is identical, some scenes are acted similarly, even the 1960s fashion and makeup. (...) For a viewer who is not familiar with the film, this is not a problem, the aware viewer may focus on the details of acting and situations. He can watch how the contact with the Visitor individualizes the stances of the father (Jan Englert), the mother (Danuta Stenka), the children (Katarzyna Warnke i Jan Dravnel) and Emilia, the maid (Jadwiga Jankowska-Cieślak). Instead of the cinematic imagery and allusiveness, there is the closeness to the actors who on behalf of their characters more or less bravely tackle the problems presented in the film. The physical dimension of their presence is so clear that, following Pasolini, Jarzyna decided to remove dialog from this part of play.
(...) After the departure of the Visitor, the characters must face the negative effects of the newly acquired human identity, sexuality and awareness of the irrational which makes them similar to Adam and Eve. The daughter gets catatonic, the mother turns into a nymphomaniac who desperately wants to find a young lover amongst the hobos in the street, the son experiencing such pressing need to create a portrait of the one that has left them madly paints more and more pictures, the father gives away his factory to the workers and having taken off his clothes goes naked to the desert and, finally, the maid who used to be open to the metaphysical becomes a saint and miracle maker.
The play ends with a press conference where the father tries to explain his radical decision, or rather he tries to avoid answers regarding art, miracles and God... He, the reader of great Russian literature is unable to find the right words to express his opinion. His story will be further related by the narrator (Rafał Maćkowiak) who is the director’s alter ego. Contrary to Pasolini who chose to watch the downfall of bourgeois ideals emotionlessly, Jarzyna decided to take a more personal and more emotional approach. (...)