John Webster wrote at a very young age The Duchess of Malfi at a very young age (according to the habits of that time – for example Shakespeare – it was adapted from different sources) and I think he did not think that he could compose one of the super popular opuses of the stage of the century. From the point of view of staging, it was many times more popular than Shakespeare was (if we do not count in the repertoire of Globe). It is a real thriller drama; first one, then another family die in it, and an informer-like character of an informer is at variance with himself. There are rebellion, self-awareness, glorification in it meanwhile; there are passions, elevated ambitions, conspiracy and cruel vendetta; there are great and petty death: there is everything here, if we are able to watch all, which is possible.

And there are national antecedents too: on one hand the guest performance of Cheek by Jowl, The Duchess of Malfi, directed by Declan Donnellan - there was a wonderful performance by the troupe and wonderful performance of the Duchess on a giant chessboard. Then Tim Carroll put the play on stage in Bárka Theatre – from the disturbing and thin performance Dorottya Udvaros shined out with her complicated and excellent performance of the main character; then Gábor M. Koltai on his – that time – usual geometrical place directed a sensitive performance in Nyíregyháza.

And now it is put on stage by Zoltán Balázs in the National Theatre – it is not surprising at all that mostly the vison, the form, the style can catch our interest. After Faust in the Puppet Theatre here the alive actors get a puppet-like look: there are huge hats on their heads, on the top of them a huge mask is the “crown”. Huge puppet-like rigid hands are connected to them, which are moving on a fixed choreography, that way they follow the text. Both of them can be seen Julia Taymor’s famous staging in the Oedipus Rex; the Stravinsky opera was put on stage in Japan in 1992, on the Saito Kinen Festival it got many awards, then it travelled through the world on DVD. The size and nature of similarity indicate that here is at least a “narrowing down” (It is Péter Esterházy’s rich word for the situation); maybe it would be great if they had referred to it on the programme, but as you can see again in case of Esterházy, that it is not obvious at all.

The two brothers of the Duchess of Malfi want to prevent the widow duchess’ second marriage for different reasons. Her elder brother, the Cardinal because of pure heartlessness and immorality (the character, whose pontifical ambition has fallen, keeps a secret lower, and with a poisonous Bible has killed her cruelly too), her twin brother, Ferdinand does it because of passionate love of a brother (which is not very clear in the performance), anyway they also mention some financial advances. But the duchess gets married very fast with her own steward, with Antonio (who is very surprised by the decision, but because of fast acts he does not have many to think it over, not even his own feelings: it is a forced path on its own), and she has given birth to three kids, by the time her secret has revelled, and made her brothers angry.

The secret is found out by Bosola, who is a man, employed as an informer, who has his own separate drama – in Zoltán Balázs’ performance he is the only character without hat and gloves, and he is performed by László Sinkó, who is the most vivid and the most dynamic one too. Between its motifs the cruelty, the greed, the suppressed ambitions, the pity, the rising sense of justice and the anger are mixed – and all of them followed by actions. He killed – according to his commission – Antonio, who has known before his death, that his wife, the Duchess of Malfi and one of his sons are dead. He is the one who killed also the Cardinal, who is dispassionately and cynically evil, because he has “got the scales of Justice”, as Bosola said it; then he is the one, who kills the totally mad Ferdinand, who is “the main reason of his fall”.

Judit Gombár’s big grey walls (on which sliding elements opens a door-like hole and play for the lighting) as they would border a church; low lines of benches are one after another, then a deep well is built of them, which swallows dead bodies. In the big space the actors perform mostly with their physical existences (however we can hear or understand them, as the director does not care about the bad acoustic, as he has given it a main role again), it seems like puppets are moving on a huge puppet stage. There is a slight possibility to the nuanced formation of characters, and sensitive performances – anyway the short cut performance mostly cares about the act as the play tries to get above the form. In this fight László Sáry’s music gives a great help anyway, which has a great role in creating the atmosphere, but we have a chance only during the last half an hour to understand and feel at the same time, what is going on. The acts of death are beautiful for example: they get the hat from the characters’ heads, pull the huge gloves of them; and the appearing hair and pure hands can show the people, who have already been dead.

The actors’ professionalism can be seen in their disciplined performance: Bori Péterfy as The Duchess of Malfi, János Kulka as the Cardinal, Zsolt László as Ferdinand and Zalán Makranczi as Antonio can bring emblematically those emblems of the figures, which the director has imagined. Frigyes Hollósi has been able to do a little bit more, who plays more roles, Eszter Bánfalvi, who performs Julia, the Cardinal’s lover, has a strong scene too – obviously László Sinkó performs the drama mostly, as Bosola, he can brings it to those, who get themselves through the boring beauty of the form.

Vit Lukás, Magyar Narancs, 2009

(translated by: Veronika Fülöp)