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The Dragonslayers
Written by Milena Marković
Directed by Iva Milošević
The Dragonslayers is an ironic historic lesson, it tells the story of the assassination of the archduke Franz Ferdinand using bustling poetic language to express the demand for freedom. It is not a historical play, but a contemporary piece which examines the position of a young man and his need to express the desire – to be free.
Milena Marković’s The Dragonslayers is dedicated to Gavrilo Princip and the Mlada Bosna movement (Young Bosnia – a political movement who pleaded for the people’s emancipation from the Habsburg Empire). A seventeen-year-old-boy with a gun, a would-be poet whose name represents a historical symbol and a frequent subject of dispute, is presented as the protagonist of this new work by Milena Marković, a poet and a dramaturg whose work is about constantly breaking down prejudices.
The piece is written as a “heroic cabaret”, in a form of an ironic history lesson, and tells the known story of the assassination using bustling poetic language to express the key demand – the demand for freedom. Historical figures are brought to the stage, the conspirators, Young Bosnians, together with the world of ordinary people and their different understanding of the event and its essential meaning. Different characters and situations are built by eight actors that play a few dozens of characters in a few dozen situations.
Milena Marković, born in 1974, is a poet, playwright, scriptwriter and lecturer of script writing. She is one of the most interesting figures in the Serbian artistic community today. Her poems have been published around the world, and her plays are widely performed in theatre; her manuscripts attract attention with their originality. Marković’s play Tracks was performed at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 2002. The text was awarded various times, and was also published in the German theatre magazine Theater heute. Her most recent poetry was published in Sinn und Form magazine and Wasafiri magazine (London).
The Dragonslayers
Written by Milena Marković
Directed by Iva Milošević
With Jovana Gavrilović, Mirjana Karanović, Dubravka Kovjanić, Milan Marić, Nikola Rakočević, Srđan Timarov, Radovan Vujović
Set designer Gorčin Stojanović
Costume designer Maja Mirković
Composer and musician Vladimir Pejković
Choreographer Boris Čakširan
Premiere on the 7 June 2014
At the Yugoslav Drama Theatre, Belgrade, Serbia
Produced by the Yugoslav Drama Theatre, Belgrade, Serbia
In context of the TERRORisms Project of the U.T.E.
Text is published as an E-Book by CulturBooks
Freely downloadable in Serbian and in English & German translation
On stage the 26 June 2015 20:00
At the TERRORisms Festival Stuttgart, Germany
Performance in Serbian with English subtitles
Published on 10 June 2015
