Behind The Curtains
“Please switch off your mobile phones.” Two technicians are checking the sound and are taking care of the multimedia. Silence fills up the theater hall. A deep breath comes from the second row. “Me and the two other actors that play this one character, Victor — the servant, comment on what is actually not present on stage. We go in and out of situations in the form of text and feelings,” says the actor Aladin Aliibrahim.
All three of them now turn with solemn movements to the audience and start to narrate the story of “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” Oscar Wilde’s all time creation. They would either empathize to what happens in some scenes, or stay unmoved, showing the audience a specific thing that happened. The spectators are about to closely experience narcissism and naïve youth. “The topic that excites me the most in this masterpiece is how a person is capable of losing his soul to having the whole world,” says the actor.
The novel-based play is an on-going production, travelling around Bulgaria. This time it makes its stop in Blagoevgrad’s Drama Theater Nikola Vaptsarov, which it originates from. Stayko Murdzhev, the director of the performance, uses an adaptation of the play by Oscar Wilde’s grand-son, according to an article by The National Palace of Culture.
Dorian Gray is a young boy who gets misled by the idea of eternal youth and beauty. A mysterious portrait starts reflecting his wrongs and sins instead of him as a person. His innocence turns into a struggle with immortality and death. He does not resist temptations and devotes himself to hedonism, tragically hurting his closest people.
The actress Mariana Boneva plays Sybil Vane in the performance. She says, “Sybil Vane is a girl that falls in love with Dorian Gray. She is young and loves for the first time in her life. The two have some moments of pure and real love for a while, but with Dorian’s metamorphosis into a narcissist, he slowly starts pushing her away from himself. When this happens, she cannot handle it and kills herself — a dramatic love story.” “My favorite scene is the murder of Basil Hallward.”, says Aladin, Mariana’s colleague in the theater. “Dorian harms the one real friend that he had. Actually, Basil was killed by the new perspective on the world that Dorian had adopted.”
Aladin shares the director’s words for the performance, “Stayko Murdzhev says quite often that it really is a slapping spectacle, all action happens at a single breath. One thing blends into another — how we see Dorian in the first place, then again, after he murders Basil, and how we see him in the end.” Aladin says that the message the play has to convey is an ultra-task of the collective. According to Mariana, Stayko Murdzhev knew what personages the troupe was lacking when he decided to stage the play, so he approached actors from different cities that would fit into it and invited them for the roles.
Aladin thinks that the team is amazing and delightful. He says that everyone worked with a lot patience, love and tons of imagination, with a big part of their hearts. “Meetings with the actors from ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ are small celebrations. We lived and worked together every day for three months, and we only meet when we are playing it,” Mariana says.
Mariana has been interested in acting ever since her childhood. She started taking acting classes in third grade. She also graduated from the National Academy of Theater and Film Arts in Sofia. “Before you go on stage there is unrest, euphoria and adrenaline. Once you go on stage, you live the life of another person, and then the relief comes — not in terms of being calm, but rather that you need to play your part and be someone else.” For Mariana, what connects her to her character in the “Picture of Dorian Gray” is the fact that both girls are actresses. “Otherwise we do not overlap much. She is more childish. As I said, I am already 30.” Mariana finds herself emotional, but considers Sybil Vane even more emotional.
Aladin feels absolutely happy with acting. “This profession is amazingly beautiful. After a performance you are left with a very pleasant feeling. A very special aroma of inspiration. It is a feeling that keeps you off the ground.” Aladin is 26 years old now and is studying acting since his high school years. The actor says that backstage during a performance, he would always be the one what warms-up, but who is also cautious about what happens, so that he can react quickly if something happens. Something similar happens to his character. “Everything that happens on stage goes through us (Victor) as a feeling. After Basil’s death, we are set free together with him — our physicality and our presence becomes more liberated, in a way.”
The motto of Night of theaters was “You change the game, the game changes you.” You change the game with what you give to theater and acting, and the game changes you when you go through a certain character. It leaves a mark on you and gives you new knowledge, a different perspective on life, people, and love even,” Aladin says. “After going through ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’, I am more conscious.”
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Lilia Tsarska studies Journalism and Mass Communications at The American University in Bulgaria. She loves the stage.
