RITAM GRADA / RHYTHM OF THE CITY
Zvezdara was my springboard
How I recall my first premiere The stage was set up in the middle and the audience was all around us, with the appearance of the stage only changing later. Despite having already amassed a lot of experience at that time, I felt the satisfaction of return- ing to the theatre with that role. I received compliments from some theatre experts who said that I was reborn as an actor and demonstrated my talent with the role of Vasa. And back then I was already doing plenty of act- ing at the Yugoslav Drama Theater, as one of the acting “babes” of theatre director Bojan Stupica. What Zvezdara means to me today It was also at that theatre, alongside my acting call- ing, that I had the premiere performances as a director of the play Train, in which I acted together with Sergej Trifunović, after which I also directed the play House, according to the text authored by Nebojša “Cile” Ilić. I joyfully look forward to every date when I perform at that theatre or when the plays I direct are performed. What Zvezdara means to Belgrade It means a lot to the city that it has a theatre that searches – that isn’t dead and isn’t in crisis. And that theatre, like living art, allows the audience to consider what meaning is and how to reach a better tomorrow. What’s most important is that Zvezdara Theatre perse- veres on the journey it embarked on four decades ago.
“IT MEANT A LOT TO ME AT THE BEGIN- NING OF MY CAREER , because after my roles in TV series I had a break at the theatre for around five years. I was the manager of the Yugoslav Dra- ma Theatre in my younger days, and back then it never occurred to me to assign roles to myself or to accept them. Then theatre director Dejan Mijač gave me a role in his play The Spawning of Carp, which I per- formed, and that was the first ever play at Zvezdara. The theatre was also well received in cultural circles because of the courageous repertoire. For example, The Spawning of Carp, based on the novel by Aca Popović, had previously been banned at two thea- tres, only to be staged at Zvezdara and to experi- ence more than 250 performances. It is also interesting that this theatre initially had only a few employees. With Mijač, the Zvezdara stage was opened to the acting of Rada Đuričin, Mirjana Karanović, Bora Todorović, Lazar Ristovski, Branko Cvejić, Izet Hajdarković... My character of Vasa Vučurović in The Spawning of Carp, as a post- World War II liberator of Belgrade, was in his own way a metaphor for the struggle to also gain new liberty in the theatre. Zvezdara Theatre was the springboard for the stage presence that I would later have.
78 | Beograd » Belgrade
Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator