The text contains traces of Euripides: based on Ted Hughes’ adaptation and Anne Carson’s translation, the poet Benjámin Horváth Előd from Cluj-Napoca created his own version for the company, which was edited into its final form during rehearsals by director Andrej Visky and dramaturg Johanna Bertóti. Admetus, the king of Pheraea, is destined to die young, but Apollo, who is serving a previous sentence by the king, reaches out to the goddesses of fate and asks that if a relative will take the death in his place he may be saved. The only one willing to make this sacrifice is Alcestis, wife of Admetus. This is the tragedy. But then Heracles appears, with all sorts of unexpected surprises up his sleeve. This is the comedy. In the ancient drama competitions, the play was ranked fourth in the tetralogy, reserved for satirical plays, despite its serious, tragic themes. It is from this inextricable stylistic mixture that the real challenge and eclecticism of drama stems, to quote the theatre theorist Jan Kott: 'the drama is constantly devouring itself.' It is precisely this inextricably rich quality of the play that interested us.
The project has financed by the AFCN, Bethlen Gábor Alapkezelő Zrt., Ördögkatlan Festival and EMMI, and the Communitas Fundation.
angol változat: In 2011 Andrej graduated with a master degree in acting from the University of Babeș-Bolyai in Cluj-Napoca. In the following year he successfully applied to the directing program at the Yale School of Drama, where in 2015, after directing his thesis show titled Don Juan (Moliére), he received his Master of Fine Arts Degree.
After his studies abroad he returned to Transylvania where he worked as a freelance director, as an assistant lecturer in the Acting Department of the Babeș-Bolyai University and as a member of Váróterem Projekt/Waitingroom Project Independent Theater Company. He directed shows in three different countries (Romania, Hungary and USA) and eight theaters in many different genres. At the moment of writing his shows are performed in five different theaters, among others Caravaggio written by András Visky (Csíky Gergely State Theater, Timișoara) and Alkésztisz adapted together with Benjámin Előd-Horváth (Váróterem Projekt, Cluj-Napoca).
