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Embracing fun, theater forgets philosophy, said the famous theater historian and critic.
At the age of 87, Professor Vasil Stefanov, longtime director of the Ivan Vazov National Theater, a penetrating and insightful theatrical historian, theorist and critic, and upper-class intellectual, has passed away, the company’s leadership announced.
Director Marius Donkin, who was the first to hear the sad news, called the theater in person.
The title of one of his books – “The National Theater as Destination” is indicative and deeply true, because Professor Stefanov really made his work at the National Theater his destiny.
“As a theater director in one of the most difficult and complex years, from 1990 to 1999 and from 2003 to 2008, Professor Stefanov defended and affirmed the high standards of a real, living and necessary theater. A tribute!” in front of the memory of the actors and directors of Prof. Stefanov.
The whole life of Prof. Vasil Stefanov
is associated with the theater
For many years he worked at the Institute of Arts Studies of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, where he headed the Department of Theater Theory and History. He was Deputy Director General of the Association of Theater and Music of the Ministry of Culture (1979-1984). His honors include the title of “Doctor Honoris Causa” from NATFA and the Order “Stara Planina” of the first degree.
He is the author of the books “Drama and composition”, “Contemporary puppet theater”, “Absurdism or theater of alienation”, “The path of direction”, “The national theater as a destination”. He published his diaries in a very small edition, in which he revealed the backstage of the theater. His memoirs and thesis
caused a storm in theater circles,
in which he speaks of him from “hosanna to crucifixion”,
as a man who destroyed the elite company, firing stars and stopping famous directors in the first stage, as a savior in the difficult times of the coming democracy. Some of our first big names on stage won’t forgive it.
Our theater underwent a stressful change at the border, where the so-called transition began. It changed its public purpose. From the Renaissance and reaching the beginning of the transition, our theater was a “moral institution”, then an ideological institute, which with its inherent defended certain moral values of society by artistic means. During the socialist era he was the “first aide of the party”, he served an ideology, with the beginning of the transition he stopped doing so. serve, “says Professor Stefanov in one of his rare interviews.
He is convinced that this is a crisis of our entire society:
spiritual and moral, which cannot fail to affect the theater.
“At one point it turned out that we had lost the hierarchy of values. I don’t know if I’m wrong, but I had the idea that the collapse of our value system did not happen by accident, it seemed to be directed. Someone seemed interested in Because if you look at your around, there are people who have benefited from it Today we have no authority This is welcome for some It is unfortunate for others The result is that we are entering an age of impersonality in which personality is not a value, and the significance of personalities It is the same. For art this is unproductive “, is his opinion in the distant 2013, which still finds examples of support today.
“By embracing fun, the theater forgets philosophy, it forgets to think about the important things in life.” In the absence of fish and cancer there is a fish in the sea, “says a proverb. We pretend to see fish swimming in our theater, in fact, they mainly swim. Crabs, was the opinion of Professor Stefanov.
Time does not deny it yet.
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