Érico-Emmanuelio Schmitto „SMULKŪS VEDYBINIAI NUSIKALTIMAI“ Rež. Raimundas Banionis

Érico-Emmanuel Schmitt
Petty Marital Crimes

Premiere - 29.11.2024

The Great Hall

Érico-Emmanuel Schmitt's play Petit Crimes conjugaux ", 2003) is a comedy about married life, which can also be called a drama that encourages thinking about the relationship of a married couple, their evolution.

Fifteen years of marriage . One day, Žilis wakes up in the hospital with a bandage on his head. Have an accident? Suddenly he realizes that he does not remember anything - amnesia. A few days later, an unseen nurse, a beautiful woman, comes to the ward and says she is... his wife Lisa. She takes Gilles home (?) and slowly begins to tell him about their love and life together, which he does not remember. One of them is lying. Which one? Or maybe both? The situation turns upside down more than once.

This is a chamber play with two actors. The situation, it seems, is painfully familiar to most people - collisions between two close people, opposition, dissatisfaction with each other, and at the same time a strong connection, obligations and love are invisible.

In the play, the person himself is irradiated like an X-ray, highlighting the flaws that are not always obvious: vanity, blindness dictated by pride and ambition, possessiveness, pretensions... to illusory eternal love, inability to appreciate it. The play does not stop being relevant - human nature does not change, every time we have to play with it, deceive it, in order to understand that it is not worth joking with the noblest feelings, in this case love.

É.-E. Schmitt's dialogues are exceptional: masterful, expressive, subtle, the playwright is able to speak simply about complex matters. These are signs of talent. The playwright remains faithful to the classical theater, yet the dialogues themselves are only black letters on white paper - they come to life inspired by the intelligence, wit, erudition and talent of the actors.

"Two actors - this is both very little and very much. Little, because there is nowhere for them to hide, they are in the palm of your hand, there is not even a second of respite - all the time in the viewer's line of sight. A lot, because the actor can use barely noticeable nuances: tone of voice, glances, smile at the corner of the lips. An actor does not need to fight recklessly for the audience's attention - he has almost no competitors. But maintaining attention throughout the performance requires inhuman effort." (Raimundas Banionis)

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Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt (b. 1960) - French writer, director, one of the most popular contemporary playwrights. His works have been translated into more than 40 languages, and his plays are constantly performed on stages around the world. Often É.-E. Schmitt is called "expert of the human soul". He studied music, philology, defended his doctorate in philosophy for the work "Diderot, or the Philosophy of Temptation", taught philosophy for 3 years in Cherbourg and Chambéry. He wrote his first play "Night in Wallonia" in 1991, his second play "The Guest" brought him greater success (for which he was awarded the Molière Prize in 1994). Other notable dramas of his: "Golden Joe", "Mysterious Variations", "Frederick", "Freeman", "Hotel of Two Worlds". By the way, the performance based on the play "Mysterious Variations" starred Alain Delon, and "Frederike" starred Jean-Paul Belmondo. É.-E. were staged in the old theater of Vilnius. Schmitt's plays "The Promiscuous" (dir. G. Di Capua, 2005), "Hotel of Two Worlds" (dir. S. Račkys, 2007), "Oscar and Mrs. Rose" (dir. J. Laikova, 2015).

Raimundas Banionis (b. 1957) is a film, television and theater director. 1980 graduated from the Institute of Cinematography in Moscow. He directed documentaries, feature films ("My Little Wife", "I Don't Remember Your Face", "Children from the "American Hotel", "Jazz", "Purple Fog"), created a film opera, TV series, staged drama performances in various Lithuanian theaters . Productions of classic comedies are distinguished by their theatricality, bright characters of actors, dynamics.

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ŽILIS

Married life is a union of murderers, attacking others first and then themselves, it is a long road to death, littered with corpses. A young couple tries to get rid of other people. In an elderly couple, everyone tries to outdo their partner. When you justify a man and a woman standing in front of the mayor, do you ask yourself, will each of them be a murderer? . Translated from French by Stase Banionytė)

The performance is shown in Russian with Lithuanian subtitles

On the AllEvents portal you can always Buy tickets to an event Theater Érico-Emmanuelio Schmitto „SMULKŪS VEDYBINIAI NUSIKALTIMAI“ Rež. Raimundas Banionis, Vilnius, Vilniaus Senasis Teatras December 27

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