William Shakespeare’s lyrical comedy A Midsummer’s Night Dream was created as an opportunist drama designated to be performed during a wedding party. The ingenious faerie showing the twinkling world of forest fairy-tale beings incorporating a delicate one night’s dream, the magic play of loving couples as well as the charming performance by the craftsmen, inspired Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy to compose its extremely successful overture. Fifteen years later, requested to do so by King of Prussia Friedrich Wilhelm IV, he composed the full score. “I should like to have my dream come true of staging A Midsummer Night’s Dream, one of the most bizarre, most grotesque, and most erotic dramas offered by the non-ballet literature”, says choreographer Libor Vaculík. “To shift an idyllic comedy as far as to the dangerous brink of a grotesque, to combine reality and irrationality, to offer laugh for a while, cruelty for a while, tears for a while. I have a feeling that nothing is certain at the threshold of the new millennium... a tyrant may become a slave, a servant turns out to be a tyrant, love turns into hatred, minor is major, tango is waltz and ballet is rap. Not always, not everywhere, but certainly in the dreams and in the desires of the main characters of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”
Premiere: Apr 6, 2006
Running time: 2 hours 10 minutes with 1 intermission
Staging team
Choreography: L. Vaculík
Stage director: L. Vaculík
Libreto: L. Vaculík
Set designer: M. Černý
Costume designer: R. Šolc
Assistant choreographer: K. Dedková-Franková, H. Vláčilová, M. Šebor
Cast
Titania: N. Márová, as a guest, A. Ščekaleva, A. Spáčilová
Hermia: I. Povrazníková, K. Madejová
Helena: A. Ščekaleva, M. Gornalova
Director, Theseus: J. Kadlec, D. Dvořák, J. Kadlec
Oberon: M. Boček, M. Gebauer
Lysander: O. Novotný, J. Svoboda
Demetrius: A. Jurakov, J. Seitl
Puck: J. Kolva, D. Stránský
Egeus: J. Němeček, P. Jirsa
Bottom (Pyramus): J. Kolva, A. Jurakov
Snug (Lion): Z. Petrů, L. Lojda
Flute (Thisbe): J. Seitl, J. Slipič
Starvelling (Thisbe’s Mother, Moonshine): M. Boček, D. Dvořák, A. Akmukhametov
Snout (Thisbe’s Father, Wall): M. Gebauer, D. Dvořák
Tomcat: M. Boček, D. Dvořák
Young Elf: J. Svoboda
Director’s wife, Hippolyta: I. Povrazníková
Supplier