Oldal 148 [148]
THE SHIFTING POINT OF FEAR AND TREMBLING
The appreciation of Ferenc Källay as the Mayor, however, was unanimous
720
a
>
72
19
723
724
725
Cf. Khlestakov "is played by the thinnest Hungarian actor, László Szacsvay, [who] seems
to be bodyless, swinging on stage like a silk thread. Or like gossamer that floats in the
sultry air of the small town in Tsarist Russia." Galsai: A revizor, 7. — "He recited important
monologues lifelessly, as if he not only played the void, but became empty himself." Mihályi:
Tovsztonogov-Latinovits, 777. — “Tovstonogov advised Szacsvay not to look for the figure
in himself, but in his partners, in their eyes, in the electrical space they create, so that he
would resonate like cigarette paper. [...] He had to wear a tailcoat from the first rehearsals.
Aksyonov also asked for shoes with leather soles so that Szacsvay could walk and move
easily. He had to be light enough to jump anywhere. [...] The basis of rehearsing the scenes
of Khlestakov and Osip was improvisation. Szacsvay had to get rid of the burden of the great
role. He had to play the cramp out of himself. He had to find true physical and spiritual
lightness.” Saad: A revizor probain, 8.
Koltai: Tovsztonogov és A revizor, 11.
Källai’s Mayor was described as “living through a real tragedy in a comedy: the tragedy of
misunderstanding born of fear and suggesting frightening depths”. Bernath: A revizor, 2. —
“This mayor is a Shakespearean hero, kind of a small-town Richard III, visited by ghosts.”
Létay: A polgármester, 13. — “Tovstonogov reveals Hoffmann in Gogol. Even Kafka and
Bulgakov in Gogol. Kallai plays Shakespeare in Gogol. [...] The phantom on top of the piano
does not even have to show up later, the Mayor only glances in the same direction, as Hamlet
in Gertrude’s room or Macbeth in the banquet scene, and his imagination will become a
reality for us. [...] His tirade ‘What a jerk I am, an animal, a dumb sheep! In thirty years,
there has not been a single shopkeeper or a cunning dog who could con me!’ is built up
by Källai from the inside, using a Shakespearean monologue technique. He breaks out of
the fragmentation of eruptions justified by naturalism and makes his inner life visible in
this soliloquy with a vast arc of passion. The building — no, the rhetoric! — of tempers is
built on Shakespearean passion. And since he does not deliver his speech ‘critically’ at the
end, not as an outer opinion but as an irresistibly erupting confession, a self-defiant fit, we
do not feel mocking and comical superiority in watching and listening to him, but rather
feel tragicomic poignancy. These are the moments of a lowlife’s tragic realization, when his
blindness bursts suddenly and he begins to see clearly in the blinding light of misfortune and
anguish collapsed on him.” Molnar Gal: A polgarmester: Kallai Ferenc, 41. and 42.
Cf. “Tovstonogov [...] does not see the Mayor as evil, as someone who was born a villain.
[...] If he did so, we could study a social oddball, a psychopathological specimen, a unique
piece, but not the functioning of society, the distorting influence of circumstances, its
dehumanizing effect to bribe even the honest.” Ibid., 40.
Cf. Saad: A revizor pröbäin. Szinhaz, 5.
Mihälyi: Tovsztonogov-Latinovits, 777.
+ 146 +