Director and actor Zoltán Balázs is rehearsing both with his own company, Maladype Theatre, and with the artists of the Budapest Operetta Theatre. We spoke with him about his constant search for new paths, his perfectionist demands, and the situation of independent theatre, Hungarian theatre as a whole, and society at large.

– You are bold enough that in your latest production, Yvonne, a different audience member is chosen to play the title role at every performance. You clearly love improvisation. I suspect that both in life and in keeping your company together, you have needed a tremendous amount of improvisation.

– I live in a state of constant replanning, which requires both a strong nervous system and improvisational skills. I also have to make sure not to take myself too seriously. One must continuously search for loopholes—passageways leading toward the goals formulated either by myself or by the company. This requires constant readiness. We must not be afraid of new impulses; we need to learn how to integrate them effectively into our long-term plans.

– In theory, you are rehearsing two productions simultaneously: Merlin with Maladype and the musical Nine at the Budapest Operetta Theatre. But because of the COVID pandemic, rehearsals for both had to be suspended. Doesn’t that make you curse a little?

– Of course it does! This forced interruption is terrible. Both Tankred Dorst’s epic Merlin and Arthur Kopit and Maury Yeston’s Nine are large-scale works, with intricate stories and numerous characters. Both deserve to be imagined and realized in a single uninterrupted creative impulse. The creators of Nine were inspired by Fellini’s 8½, a work that unfolds along thousands of threads and possesses countless dimensions.

– But musicals generally simplify things considerably.

– This musical is unconventional in many respects. For example, the characters remain continuously present on stage. The piece examines the creative individual under a microscope. The protagonist is forty-three years old—exactly my age at the moment. In these times, when we are forced to reduce our momentum and accustomed pace to zero, we have the opportunity to reflect deeply on both the external and internal dimensions of the creative process.

– And what have you discovered about yourself?

– That searching for the way forward will remain a permanent motif in my life. Within my personality, curiosity is the most fundamental driving force. I will always be interested in where I come from and where I am heading. From time to time, however, I need to take inventory. To focus fully on what is most important in a given period, I must rid myself of excess baggage.

– Is the fact that you come from Transylvania still a defining aspect of who you are?

– Absolutely. I carry Transylvania within me. I come from there and lived there until I was twelve. But I do not brandish minority identity like a sword, and I strongly dislike it when others abuse it for their own purposes.

– What did you bring with you from there?

– Among other things, the realization that there are no absolutes in the world, and that truth and love do not judge.

– You once said that half your personality remained in Transylvania.

– My twelve-year-old self truly remained at the railway station in Sighetu Marmației. When I die, I will go back for him, and together we will depart into the unknown. I am the protagonist of a continuous inner journey that I hope is moving toward a form of enlightenment and self-awareness. Reality and imagination are constantly intertwined in my life. My face and my mask frequently exchange places. This is especially characteristic of artists, but it is true of everyone: behind the mask reflecting our social role lies our true self.

– Is your mask that of the obsessed alternative director who works day and night?

– For some people, perhaps. There is always an image of us reflected by our environment. You were there at the beginning of my career—you know how eagerly people attached the “enfant terrible” label to me. Thankfully, that title has now been passed on to Attila Vidnyánszky Jr., and eventually someone else will inherit it from him. There is always a designated savior, a little messiah whom people believe will shake up Hungarian theatre. Then both the chosen ones and those who choose them eventually realize that this is not a solitary game.

– Did you ever believe you would save theatre—or the world?

– No. What I believed was that what I represented through my own theatrical universe would contribute something to an open and diverse theatrical canon. I tried to achieve this with such “reckless” collaborators as Ilona Béres, Andrea Ladányi, Erzsébet Kútvölgyi, Mari Törőcsik, László Sinkó, and Károly Kuna. I hoped that productions such as Theomachia, Empedocles, The Blacks, The Duchess of Malfi, and Faust I–II—which approached sensitive subjects in unconventional ways—would inspire others as well.

– The people you mentioned only joined individual productions. In my opinion, the truly reckless ones were those who remained members of your company for six or seven years. They devoted that period of their lives almost entirely to you and to the work. Family life and private life hardly seem compatible with it. You rehearse day and night; it demands extraordinary concentration and considerable physical and emotional stamina.

– You have summarized it perfectly. It is a way of life. Only those who wish to invest in their professional development at the beginning of their careers can truly undertake it as company members. For individual adventures, highly accomplished artists like those I mentioned often join us. It is worth doing only as long as it brings joy. Once someone begins to value family, financial security, a home, a car, or greater popularity more highly, then it is time to let go of Maladype. Yet that person’s talent and work become permanently woven into the company’s history. I need only mention a few names: Kamilla Fátyol, Hermina Fátyol, Artúr Kálid, Balázs Dévai, Erzsébet Soltész, Ákos Orosz, Zoltán Lendváczky, Ádám Tompa, and Zsolt Páll.

– There were times when your company was practically starving, trying to survive on minimal support. You even issued a public statement concerning the activities of the committee evaluating operational grants.

– Our operating support decreases year after year because there are preferences and entanglements between certain members of the committee and particular artistic workshops that are unworthy of our theatrical community. The committee should embody a spirit free from politics and insular professional groupings. Professionally committed curators and artistically successful ensembles should meet one another on grant platforms. It is enough to note that this year’s call for applications is virtually identical to those of previous years. It has not adapted in any way to the radically altered circumstances created by the pandemic. This means that nobody is addressing its impact; nobody seems interested. Presumably, this is because the “town clerk” and the “clerk’s wife” already know in advance who will receive how much. I continue to find this unacceptable.

– When there is no pandemic, does your company earn most of its income from international guest performances?

– Generally speaking, yes. The absence of touring opportunities now represents a huge vacuum in our lives. Even if invitations await us from Egypt to Peru, we cannot travel until we have received the vaccine and possess official proof of vaccination. We have no idea when we will be able to return to the international stage, but we are eagerly awaiting that moment.

– Many independent theatres will probably not survive. Support tailored to the current situation does not seem forthcoming.

– Many have already disappeared. And then they will be replaced by one little company or another.

– Do you mean companies that, like fake political parties, are primarily interested in obtaining funding while engaging only in superficial activity?

– Partly. I think it is important that new groups emerge and that they receive adequate start-up capital. What I miss is a long-term concept and strategy in their artistic and operational plans. In previous years, the curators repeatedly stated that six companies—including ours—should long ago have been granted special status. These ensembles, with serious achievements and years of proven viability behind them, should by now have been moved into a distinguished category. Well, that change is still waiting to happen.

– You once described professional solidarity within the theatre community as an illusion. Do you still think so?

– Unfortunately, yes. It would require generosity. It would require reconciling many different perspectives, truths, and arguments. Today, when the existence of artists is largely determined by which club they belong to, this seems impossible. Almost everyone has developed a compulsion to align themselves—to the right, the left, upward, or downward. I have always tried to stay out of that. My concern lies with the complex nature and mechanisms of theatre itself. There is enormous tension among the participants in our theatrical public life. Many are on the verge of explosion. This certainly does not make it easier to return either to the essence of theatre or to one another. If we are to free ourselves from the grip of this hundred-headed “virus hydra” and finally resolve our common affairs, we will have to forgive one another. We should begin with ourselves. If we prove incapable of discussing our views on a professional basis, then parties, clubs, and tribes will determine our lives.

– You have played Hamlet, Mack the Knife, and Richard III. Why have you not acted for quite some time?

– I continue to receive offers, but caring for my own company and directing abroad do not always allow me to accept them. I have lived on stage as Hamlet, Richard III, and Viktor Kravchenko, and I know that such roles demand the whole person.

– Kravchenko’s book was so important to you that Maladype published the Hungarian translation. Yet at the premiere, you felt you had failed to convey the text effectively. You announced that you would stop the performance and refund the audience’s tickets. Fortunately, you continued. Such things happen very rarely.

– Something similar happened when I was playing Hamlet. During the performance, I felt that my mental capacity had run out, and I asked the audience for a little time. It happened just before the monologue beginning “How all occasions do inform against me...” One voice in my head said: Keep going. They paid for their tickets. Continue the show. The other voice said: What are you pretending for? You are exhausted and want to fall silent. Obeying the second voice, I rested briefly and then reconstructed the opening thoughts of the monologue word by word, building Hamlet’s speech from the ground up. It possessed astonishing power.

– Your current company consists of members of an acting class that graduated from the University of Arts in Târgu Mureș.

– For three and a half years now.

– Most of them are not from Transylvania; they simply went there to study.

– Exactly.

I directed their graduation production, August. Seeing how talented they were and how sensitive they were to each other’s energies, I decided to offer them contracts.

– There has already been a trend of students from Hungary going to Târgu Mureș to study theatre. Do you think the events surrounding the University of Theatre and Film Arts in Budapest could strengthen this tendency?

– This year, significantly more people applied to Târgu Mureș than last year.

– In your view, where is Hungarian theatre heading?

– We need to find a new, comprehensive interpretation of our shared tasks. Mediocre, petty-minded, and professionally immature people should take a step back.

Interview by Gábor Bóta, 168 Óra, 2021

translated by: Zsuzsanna Juraszek