According to the most careful adjectives, it is an intensive theatrical experience, if the viewer can meet King Philip even if, the Spanish ruler is not on the stage. Other times the Duke of Alva is sitting in front of the viewers, and while a scene is going on behind him, Alva’s slowly raised pointing finger becomes a sign, then turns out that he just scratches his nose. Even the staring means attention, and if the viewers get closer with a metre, they could become the part of the happenings, and they were not been able to avoid it. They are touched by the breeze of action, when Philip kicks Carlos from himself, or follows him in a crouching way, as Egmont almost rapes Clara. Because all of these are happening in a distance of half of a metre, we can smell the sweat of the fighters, we can see the pushes of muscles, so it is a more sensitive experience. The Base of Maladype in reality creates a mercilessly close connection between the performers and the viewers. That way, in their performances of Don Carlos / Egmont, the plays by Schiller and Goethe, are connected not only by the idea of freedom, the failing wants, or the rebellion against despotism, but the showing from the merciless closeness: the fact that the passions have not got lost in the fog of the past times, but they are with us and hurt us.

It is four hours long, with two intervals, the great task of who knows how many hundreds of pages of traditional texts, can make moving the monumentality of the appreciated plays. The happenings take place in the permanent light of the white room on a central piece of set. Those characters of Don Carlos, who are not acting at the given moment, are sitting on a podium, which is combined by a circle shaped bench, they are presented as silent puppets, the performers refer to them, and when their turns come, they jump up vividly. With the mode of performance, which is adjusted to the tiny place, Zoltán Balázs, the director can speed the tempo up. There is not any in and out going, not any waving of flags, they do not have to reorganise the place after a tense moment, the story is going on without any brakes.

Judit Góczán, the dramaturg, speeds up Schiller long, slow lines by concentrating on the most important moments of the main characters and she can show us that way the excitement of the story. Only Posa and Philip’s dialogue becomes a little bit slower, many ideological backgrounds appear here, but of course, without any content, the play would remain naked. The rhetoric is indicated by the witty solution: while Philip is talking about that how can he imagine the success of his country in spite of Posa’s critic, the gives orange nicely to the marquis. In Judit Gombár’s set everything happens under the treetop of a wonderful orange tree, in the grove of Aranjuez, but those, who has more symbolic sense, can associate to the growing of tyranny. Finally, the orange garden of power becomes empty: the failed ones and the servants leaves the room, and leave the king on his own, in his heartbreakingly lonely room.

The intimate place makes the figures of Don Carlos with great arcs, pure. Actors, who speak beautifully leaves the pathos of iambus. Everything is a little bit more prosaic, they are not petty, but a little bit clearer, while the gear wheels of the relationship can the machine of great acts move. Examining from very close the sufferings of Don Carlos and the others, similar to follow the inner pain of a family. Zoltán Lendváczky performs a hyperactive Don Carlos, he is still an immature kid, who is suffering while trying to get love, he is friendly, he has not known why, but he would like to leave, and his conflict with Alva is more like a teenager like arrogance than hate. Károly Kuna, as King Philip is the worried father, who is moved by his responsibilities, there is something statue like, in his character, some lonely unhappiness, and some kind of bloodthirstiness at the same time, like in case of a Mayan god, when sometimes anger bursts out of him and Mari Benedek skirt like costume swishes on him. László Keszég’s Duke of Alva is a little bit less sharp, he is a darker figure, as he is watching respectfully, but motionlessly, with his gazing, big eyes like a crocodile that is looking for prey. Ákos Orosz’s Marquis de Posa has many colours, he acts by Carlos like an elder brother, he tolerates carefully and understandingly the young one’s outbursts, but he explains to Philip with the drive of a freedom fighter, and with resigned silence let Elizabeth reach his hand. According to the scene the queen’s heart, performing by Erika Tankó, would seem to be beaten for Posa and not for “her son”. Gabriella Varga shows Princess Eboli as an attractive and silly maid, while Gyöngyi Blasek’s Grand Inquisitor is heavy even with her airy figure, as a gloomy angel gets Carlos’ life to be protected from the king.

In the Don Carlos has already had something from the fate, but the other play of the evening, talks about failure, as it would be the necessary resulting product of the rebellious drive in any case. Egmont takes us into the confused German land, and the performance grabs mostly the subversion of the world, in a special performance. Everything is perfect and turned to be contemporary, the cut and got lines of Egmont work on more voices, next to the remaining, old-styled dialogues, we can listen to iconic, pop-songs, and they can strengthen sardonically the dramaturgical stress. The story is crammed into a shallow program of a music-radio. Gabriella Varga and Gábor Jászberényi comment on the happening like disc jockeys, and with their singing and guitar playing can give ironic double button to the heroic turns.

Ákos Orosz’s dishevelled Egmont is a very passionate hero, but he is not an ideal one, he is more a half shiny and half shabby anarchistic knight of a political cartoon, who would eats up not only the tyranny but the whole world, as dissatisfied he is. His nose is dusty because of cocaine, he would have sex with Erika Tankó’s young Clara in the hole of the window: if we like it, he can be told to be the real free man, so – he has to fail. The theorem is easy. László Keszég’s Duke of Alva and his son of Ferdinand by Zoltán Lendváczky, during a wonderful beatbox, can stop Egmont. There are not any chiselled fights. There are only sensible facts: the revolution, from home, watching from the window, turns out to be intrigue and failure, they are just speeches in the cells, and meanwhile the pop or the news are flowing from the radio. The best part is, when Egmont is waiting for the verdict, and the reporters broadcast it alive, they accept calling and messages that comment the happening with the same simplification, as we have got used to them. Gyöngyi Blasek’s mother, for example, talks about the squash stew, which the main hero ate last time... It is a definite gesture, as people’s sound reacts: how would we treat an Egmont today?

László Deme Sz., szinhaz.net, 2012

(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)