Theatre Design & Technology - Feb 1970 - 13

More complex was the treatment of the
Prague production of Janacek's The Makropu/os Secret, 1965 (Figs. 3 and 4).
Part of the action of the opera is intended
to occur in a theatre; Svoboda extended
this inherently theatrical element to the production as a whole. Most of the depth of
the stage was designed to represent typical
backstage paraphernalia: flats, costume mannequins, ladders, incidental furniture. The
action of the opera occurred on a few set
pieces in front of this primarily visual background that constantly stressed the theatrical essence of the plot and revitalized its
point. The key scenographic element was a
slanted, transparent wall separating the backstage area from the forestage, where virtually all the action occurred. A variety of
projections appeared on and through its
surface, and it had the added, acoustical
virtue of providing an excellent sounding
board for the singing.

Two other productions illustrate a more total, fully organic theatricalization of the
basic works. Rigo/etto, Prague 1947, (Figs.
5-8), carried the classic theatre-in-theatre
device several steps beyond its customary
limit. To begin with, both Svoboda and Alfred Radok, the director, were bothered by
the opera's naive plot, its bloody melodrama
and pathos. In an attempt to counteract this
element, they decided to present the work
in the style of Verdi's day by placing it in a
somewhat parodistic reconstruction of a theatre of that time. Although a strong element
of the historical was present, the treatment
was theatrical rather than naturalistic. Svoboda's recollections indicate the cream of
the jest:

I built a tiny Bibiena-like stage on a turntable of the
large stage of the Smetana theatre. Everything was in
period, including some audience seats in front of the
Bibiena stage. Then, at a certain point in the action.

Figure 2: A Love for Three Oranges. Production photograph

THEATER DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY

the theatre began to rotate on the turntable and suddenly we were looking at its stage through its wings;
the singers proceeded to adjust to this new perspective and sang toward us in the auditorium of the
Smetana thea re hrough the wings of their heatre.
Rigoletto, for example, sang his aria 10 a costumer or
ballerina in the wings. At other times we showed
waiting performers flirting with backstage gentlemen
callers. In other words, the action was presented in
the context of the backstage of a theatre. The result
was a great charm and a loss of traditional opera·
ness. Technically. we took pains with all the ele·
rnenlS; for instance, the period stage machinery that
was revealed to the audience as they looked into the
wings was specially manufactured for the production.

A production such as this raises numerous
theoretical questions of artistic convention
and even terminology. For example, the
careful recreation of period stage machinery
is in itself close to, if not equivalent to,
naturalism; and yet it is part of a larger effort that is utterly anti-naturalistic in terms
of the production as a whol e. Such paradoxes and contradictions enliven a great

(photo: Jaromir Svoboda)

FEBRUARY, 1970

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