28 November | 16:00 – www.fnt.ro
Available for online viewing EXCLUSIVELY ON ROMANIAN TERRITORY from Saturday 28 November 16:00 till Monday 30 November 16:00.
”I told myself that one could learn to die, that I could learn to die, that one can also help other people to die. This seems to me to be the most important thing we can do, since we’re all of us dying men who refuse to die” ‒ playwright Eugène Ionesco motivates the genesis of his play ”Exit the King”.
Translated by: Vlad Russo and Vlad Zografi
Cast:
Bérenger the First, the King: Victor Rebengiuc
Queen Marguerite, Bérenger’s first wife : Mariana Mihuț
Queen Marie, Bérenger’s second wife: Ana Ciontea
The Doctor, who is also the King’s surgeon, executioner, bacteriologist, and astrologer:: Șerban Pavlu
Juliette, maid and nurse: Florentina Țilea
The Guard: Richard Bovnoczki
Directed by: Andrei and Andreea Grosu
Set design by: Vladimir Turturica
Light Design: Chris Jaeger
Duration: 1h 45mins
Producer: National Theatre Bucharest – 2017
The text is the warmest, most touching and honest confession of the man Eugène Ionesco about the great final encounter. The endless unrests, the permanent agony from his Journals find their dramatic outlet in one of the most profound „poems” about death and its acceptance. An allegoric metaphor of the Passage, a mirroring confession of one’s own conscience. Bérenger’s inner struggle ‒ his revolt, fear, fright, terror, sadness, joy, desire to live, memories, nostalgia, resignation ‒ is nothing but a rite of passage through which he, the man, learns acceptance, learns to die. But Bérenger is not alone. He has his spouse at his side. Queen Marguerite and Queen Marie ‒ two facets of one and the same woman. Marguerite ‒ the initiator, the one facilitating the access to other worlds, “the world before birth and the one after” ‒ she brings him to the world and she also helps him step into the afterworld; Marie ‒ the image of grace, tenderness, frailty ‒ powerless in the face of Death. ”Exit the King” is a show of an overwhelming emotion, where each of us plays the leading role.
Photo credit: Florin Ghioca
