Sold out performance venues accompany the 5th edition of the
Interferences International Theatre Festival in Cluj, which focuses on the idea of strangeness. The most popular performance of the first week was Shakespeare’s
Measure for Measure, directed by
Declan Donellan, a coproduction of the
Moscow Art Drama Theatre Pushkin and the
Cheek by Jowl ensemble. The classic story placed within a contemporary Russian setting analyzes the relationship between power and the individual.
The opposition between individual and community was also the theme of the Ionesco performance staged by the National Theatre of Luxembourg. Although initially Rhinoceros was an anti-Nazi play, today it can be interpreted as a piece that has a strong voice against mass hysteria, against the thought-epidemics that hide behind reason.
In
Diary of a Madman - presented in the Studio Hall of the
Hungarian Theatre of Cluj - the actor from the
Katona József Theatre in Budapest,
Tamás Keresztes, brilliantly played the role of the clerk who is constantly losing his sense of reality. The other important „character” of the play was the loop that created the environment and the atmosphere of the piece, with the help of which the play’s music was created live during the performance.
Occuring in parallel with the theatrical performances are the two separate workshops which are taking place within the festival: a total number of 30 young people are taking part in the seminar organized for young critics by the the International Association of Theatre Critics, and the workshop organized by the
European Theatre Union for young journalists. The participants come from all over the world, from Hong Kong to Turkey and the Czech Republic to numerous other countries.
The Thursday and Friday program of the festival awaits its visitors not only with performances from Macedonia, Bulgaria and Bucharest, but also with two additional concerts. Tickets for the performance can be purchased online at www.biletmaster.ro, as well as at the theater’s ticket office (between 10 am and 1 pm, and an hour before performances), concert attendance is free of charge
