Theatricalizing Politics / Politicizing Theatre

Abstract

On Yugoslavia, where I lived in the early 1990s, politics was theatrical and theatre was political. We used to compare the local political life to “theatre of the absurd” and describe the downfall of the country as “tragedy” and “theatre of cruelty.” In return, one of the most valued qualities of the local theatrical tradition and activity has been its capacity for political subversion. However, when the dramatic political circumstances started outdoing all fiction, theatre hit the streets through a series of ongoing protest activities. When the first protest against the ruling regime started, on 9 March 1991 in Belgrade, the police violently attacked the protesters, trying to prevent the leaders of the democratic opposition from addressing the crowd. The artistic director of the National Theatre opened the door of the building, enabling the protest to continue from the theatre’s balcony.1 In the days following this event, mass protests continued in the heart of the city, around an improvised stage, where one of the leading Yugoslavian actors served day and night as kind of MC. He was joined by other artists who came to give their support, keeping the spirits of the protesters high and the constant threat of Milosevic’s police and army at bay.2 When the space of a theatrical institution became a place of political protest, the relationship between theatre and politics in this context had undergone a transition from theatre as a political metaphor, theatre as a by-phenomenon, to theatre as a deliberate device and strategy of street demonstrations.