class="">Robert Wilson: “Reading Rhinoceros today- it’s like a breath of fresh air…”

Tonight, the National Theatre Festival officially closes its gates, in an exceptional manner, at the “Marin Sorescu” National Theatre of Craiova, with a showing of “Rhinoceros”, by Eugene Ionesco, in the directorial view of Robert Wilson. The reputable director gave us an exclusive interview for the event.

Interview by Pompilius Onofrei

45 years ago, in his apartment in Paris, Eugene Ionesco invited you, Mr. Wilson, to look over his work, expressing his conviction that you could be the director through which his works would gain new meanings, as well as the desired and necessary nuances. 44 years of experience had to pass in the great adventure of Art for you to decide to re-ignite that kind of “light” which characterises you up so well, upon one of Ionesco’s pieces…and what a piece!…: “Rhinoceros”- perhaps the harshest, most difficult, most complexly socially-committed of Ionesco’s writings…Why did it take so long for you to decide?

Thought I’ve felt a certain affinity towards Ionesco from the very beginning, perhaps I wasn’t sure, for a long time, if I had reached to correct perspective in order to stage his creations. Ever since I first came in contact with this play, after I’ve met the author, I knew already that I’ll need some distance to ponder on the ways I could respect its meanings and most eloquently make it “shine”.

How did you decide upon “Rhinoceros”?

I was asked, for the longest time, to stage “The Chairs”, but I was far more interested in “Rhinoceros”, a text I find to be much more complex. After many years of pondering upon this play- I finally decided to do it.

If you were to choose between modernity and contemporaneity / which term would you use to describe Ionesco’s work today?…and what meaning would you bestow now, in the 21^st Century, on the epithet of “absurd”, so frequently associated with the theatre he created?

I think what Ionesco created is still significant, maybe even more relevant today, when we see a Western theatre that’s so “naturalist” and “psychological”. To read this text today- it’s like a breath of fresh air.

The concept you use for “Rhinoceros” (…) underlines the unbearable loneliness which hails from this Craiova staging, in which you chose to transform the author in a storyteller-playwright, using the lines(as well as the whole body of work) for a much higher purpose. How intentional is this “upside-down” approach, instead of the original text?

Loneliness was and remains my main attraction to this play of Eugene Ionesco.

High class technology plays a determining factor in your work, always augmenting a certain meta-textual emotion, overcoming the expectations of the viewer. And you never concede, no matter where you set the show. How did you manage to move beyond these difficulties when working with the troupe of the Craiova National?

When I met Mircea Cornişteanu, but especially after I met the wonderful actors of the Theatre in Craiova, I knew we’d find a way of staging the show together.

So working with the actors of the troupe in Craiova proved inspirational, or did you have to adapt the initial concept to the ley of the land?

I worked closely with the actors and we modelled the show in accordance to their personalities. I made a selection of actors who would be complimentary to one another. And this thing- it already generated a complex story.

The invitation of “Rhinoceros” in the National Theatre Festival would have been a must for any selection manager, because the production is an event all on its own. But Marina Constantinescu chose this event as the official closing act of the Festival, as a crowning jewel of this annual synthesis of Romanian theatre. From this perspective- how do you comment upon the choice, and how “Romanian” do you think this “Rhinoceros” to be?

When I work at a production, I’m always influenced by the actors, by the theatre, the city I’m in, the country I’m in. It’s about real collaboration. From this perspective- I never know who influenced whom or who did what…

Photo: Pomergranate Arts