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ENDRE MARTON: THE DEATH OF MARAT, 1966
of previous years. Even if actors did not use alienation effects,°°* their limited
movements, gestures and the subtlety of building their characters lessened
the passion of acting severely.
Gyorgy Kalman was sitting in a bathtub all the time, forced to be almost
immobile, and was “interpreting incendiary thoughts [...] without gestures,
relying only on the nuances of his voice and face”.°% This was the consequence
of the character’s heroic portrayal, similarly to the fact that Kalman’s Marat
was not felt to be played by an inmate, so “he was preaching from his tub
as a perfectly realistic prophet”.°°° Imre Sinkovits underscored de Sade’s
“measured attitude, distinguished skepticism and cool temperament” as well,
but “his excitement, his hidden, sick glow"""" and “the lunacy of obsession”°°®
could also be felt, reaching their emotional peak in the moments of his
voluntary flagellation. Sinkovits and Kalman “could certainly not become
a Kossuth Prize winner and an Artist of Excellence regardless of this
production"." It was only Hédi Varadi that the critics highlighted in addition
to them, saying that she showed “a thousand colors in spite of simplicity”,°” and
passion was overshadowed by somnambulism and depression in her portrayal
of Charlotte Corday. Reviewers agreed that, with her colleagues, “she had
succeeded in an acting technique that interlaced the spectators’ feelings and
thoughts, avoiding the wrong extremes of naturalistic overcharacterization
and illustration confined to cold signals”.°”!
564 A reviewer (erroneously) recognized “the persistent use of Verfremdungseffekte” in the
production, claiming that “this much-debated dramaturgical method had prevailed in
Hungarian theatre for the first time with such strictness and consistency”. Mihalyi: A kegyet¬
lenség szinhäzätöl, 617.
Molnär G.: Marat-Sade, 7.
Doromby: Szinhäzi krönika, 271. — Judit Szäntö argued that the play did not really provide
the opportunity of double characterization in Marat’s case. Yet Kälmän could fuse two
characters: Marat and the patient who played him, but this was not the goal. “The miracle of
his performance lies in the way he resolves the contradiction in his role; he ‘brings himself
to a second life’ mentioned above [i.e. to a life independent from de Sade], and becomes
the symbol of immortal revolution within the framework of the grotesque tragicomedy of
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Charenton.” Kalman conveyed a clear process of ideas: “he was a man who could be defeated
and an idea which is invincible”. Sz. Szanté: Marat és De Sade, 6.
Matrai-Betegh: Jean Paul Marat, 9.
Szombathelyi: Marat haldla, 2.
Gábor: Színházi figyelő, 236.
Geszti: Charentoni színjáték, 8.
Dersi: Marat győzelme, 7.
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