Glej,
Soap Opera

A soap opera blending into a psychological study.

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About the performance

Prince Myshkin arrives in St Petersburg, where he meets General Totsky, the jealous Aglaya and the competitive Ganya. Soap Opera offers a different perspective on this familiar story and analyses their relationships: with unique visual effects and polyphonic dialogues it offers a studious insight into their subconsciousness.

In the second part of Soap Opera, directed by Marko Čeh and featuring an expanded cast, we discover the psychological depths of the world of Fyodor M. Dostoyevsky's The Idiot, the basis of Soap Opera's two-part original performance, which, using soap walls as its central scenographic element, offers an original take on the Russian realistic novel.

Although tragic, the development of the novel's events can be understood from several angles thanks to the polyphonic narrative, as the protagonists' dialogue takes place on the levels of the spoken and the unspoken. These polyphonic layers open up a psychological world which serves as the basis for director Marko Čeh's original performance in Soap Opera, which transforms into a psychological study. In it, we enter the subconscious, where the actors pass between the hunches of memories and forgotten traumas and become aware of their potential resolutions. The complex battles for social status and dramatic romantic entanglements of the original Soap Opera performance are shown through the prism of the psychological states of the individual actresses and their complex pathologies.

The depiction of the inner world is conjured up by a scenographic technology made of soap. Its fascinating visual colour palette, the play of light and its unstable nature make up the main part of the scenographic environment: soap walls will build and break down the walls between the rooms where the conversations take place, cages will be drawn with the help of strings, soap rollers will draw the treetops, ... The unusual texture of the soap helps to build volatile inner worlds, potentiating in a visually perceptive way either the sensible or the irrational thoughts of the characters and their feelings.

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Credits

Director: Marko Čeh
Dramaturgy: Kaja Balog
Adaptation of the text: Kaja Balog, Marko Čeh
Stage design (scenography, costumography, light design, puppet design, video design): Stran22
Programming: Luka Frelih
Music: Gašper Torkar
Proofreading: Mateja Dermelj
Performers: Niko Goršič, Gregor Prah, Gaja Višnar, Anže Zevnik
Voice: Primož Pirnat

Video: Borut Bučinel
Photography: Marijo Zupanov
Editor of Glej, Paper: Tery Žeželj
Graphic design: Grupa Ee / Mina Fina, Ivian Kan Mujezinović
Technical director: Grega Mohorčič
Technical support: Brina Ivanetič, Žan Rantaša, Samo Dernovšek
Creative and executive production: Anja Pirnat, Nastja Miheljak
Produced by Glej Theatre
Supported by Ministry of Culture and Municipality of Ljubljana

Special thanks to:
Casino Admiral, University Medical Centre Ljubljana, Timotej Jevšenak, Jože Drabik, Stanka Škodič, Wine Zorz, Pelicon Brewery

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Soap Opera (2022)

event / Marko Čeh

Premiere
December 10th 2022 / at 20h / Glej Theatre

Soap Opera is an event that borders on the impossible, as the scenography is entirely composed and made of three drops of water. Caught between two walls of surfactants, they are easier to recognize as soap walls which images we used to enjoy in our childhood, when we used to blow and burst bubbles with enthusiasm. But soap walls can also, with the right lighting, build worlds and spaces that we can only imagine in our dreams, because these walls are never still, they are always re-establishing themselves and bursting, and when we let them exist, the blending spectrum of color never stops.

The story of Soap Opera is based on the novel The Idiot by Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky. Written in sub-novels, it was produced in a similar way to today's television 'soap operas': each week a fragment of the novel was published, involving both the classic tense situations of human relationships and the love affairs of the common Russian people and their nobility.

The first part of Soap Opera, which will be premiered on December 10th, will test soap walls as a scenographic element and their impact on the spectator. We will consider how long the set can play for itself and, by reflecting on the role of the spectator, we will become aware of another aspect of spectatorship that is often taken for granted. Where does a play begin and end if the visual elements are so conspicuous?

Credits (2022)

Director: Marko Čeh
Scenography: Anja Kozlan, Alja Mišigoj
Music: Gašper Torkar
Programming and technical support: Luka Frelih
Soap wall technology: Marko Turkuš, Marko Vivoda, Katja Pahor, Marko Čeh
Performer: Anže Zevnik
Puppetmaker: Leon Vidmar
Video: Boštjan Božič Boško
Technical director: Grega Mohorčič
Technical support: Brina Ivanetič
Executive production: Anja Pirnat, Nastja Miheljak
Produced by Glej Theatre
Support: Ministry of Culture, Municipality of Ljubljana

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