Faust (Faust Is Dead)

HaDivadlo, Brno, Czech Republic, 2001
Author: Mark Ravenhill
Directed by Jiří Pokorný

about the production

The Faustian topic transformed into a story of two men of this century – that is the content of the play by Mark Ravenhill, a young, but already world-famous English author. His plays have been performed all over the world and more or less everywhere they triggered a discussion about the state of theatre, drama and society. In them, the author searches for reality and truth of life feelings, no matter how much taboo they might be. But it is always the archetypal problem of being, famous to everybody under various guises. What is decisive is the extent which we are ourselves willing to admit.

Janoš Krist, theatre dramaturgist 

Staging Mark Ravenhilľs Faust (Faust Is Dead) by the Brno HaDivadlo can be called a move valuable in terms of the dramaturgy, risky in terms of the production and remarkable in terms of the audience. The Brno Faust, into which the director brilliantly implanted sparkles of portentous back humour, represents a report, disquieting both in terms of theatre and philosophy, about today's barrenness and rejected heroes. In spite of that it remains above all a production of actors with the precise performance by Tomáš Matonoha and Pavel Liška. Homosexuality highlighted in the vocabulary and in the situations will most probably be shocking for many spectators. However, Matonoha puts together with incredible nobleness a study of Alain, an educated, sad and sarcastic gay, who does not hesitate to verify life postulates through his own harsh experience.

The erotic accent of the play has been mastered in an excellent way also by director Pokorný. The rough sex of the heroes is not a means for arousal, but above all a reflection of unhappy world where it is born. Matonoha has an excellent partner in Pavel Liška, who is type disposed for the role of the elderly irritated child whose cruelty is the result of loneliness. (...)

Luboš Mareček, Mladá Fronta Dnes, 22/12/2000

 The edges of Pokorný's production are sufficiently sharp and, surprisingly, it does not lack humour either, although it is quite black and drastic...

Jana Machalická, Lidové noviny, 8/12/2000 

The production has won a prominent place in the survey of critics for the best theatre production of 2000 in the Czech Republic and in the A. Radok Foundation 2000 Competition it became Play of the Year.

 

creators

directed by: Jiří Pokorný
translation: Jitka Sloupová
dramaturgy: Lenka Havlíková
dramaturgie co-operation: Janoš Krist
music: Roman Holý
stage design: Petr B. Novák
costume design: Kateřina Štefková
characters and cast:
Alain: Tomáš Matonoha, Pete: Pavel Liška, Donny: Petr Štefek, Chorus: Mariana Chmelařová and Iva Volánková

director

Jiří Pokorný (1967)

He graduated in Directing at DAMU in Prague. In 1993 – 1997 he was director and art director of the Dramatic Studio in Ustí nad Labem, where he shaped one of the youngest and most interesting companies in the Czech Republic with its own dramaturgy and poetics (with an emphasis on staging original Czech plays). He himself is an author of several theatre plays, for which he won the Award for Best Original Play of the Year in 1997 and 1998 in the Alfréd Radok Foundation Competition (Dad Shooting Goals, R.I.P.).

He made guest appearances in the Comedy Theatre, Theatre On the Balustrade in Prague, in the J. K. Tyl Opera in Plzeň. He was a stagiare in Hermann Teirlinck in Antwerp and Royal Court School in London. Since 2001 he has been the art director of HaDivadlo in Brno.