PETAR MILOSHEVSKI

THE BEAUTIFUL - The Edge of Reason

27/03/2014

A theatre review published in the bulletin of the International Theatre Festival Mogilev, Belarus 

I confess. I confess my dear reader that now I won’t be able to be as unbiased as I was for the other festival days. Because one work came and assessed the already “prepared dish”, dig deeper into it, and finally made slightly difficult for us to come to a conclusion: was it delicious, disgusting, overdone?... Another thing is to be its preparator. Because, somehow, we appreciate more a work made by one’s own hands. But why all this preamble of mine? Because of the chance to have had the opportunity to see this performance at our festival. THE BEAUTIFUL. This humble servant also made possible to put down the language barrier between the audience and the character*. Just a bit of “seasoning” to improve the taste and give some more flavour.

But let’s talk about the show - and in particular its protagonist. The first thing that struck me deeply was the performance and versatility of Petar Miloshevski. Script, directing, acting, lighting and set, even soundtrack - all done by him. That’s certainly the best illustration of the proverb: “If you want a thing done well, do it yourself”... That is perhaps why the show was at once so thoughtful and at the same time dramatically goluptious. Every movement, every flare of light, every inch of the stage - all measured and spelt out in detail. As for the show itself, words are futile. It just needs to be seen. Seen! Facial expressions, voice intonation, words, body plasticity... Petar has tried to create the perfect balance between all these parts in his show, for which I am incredibly thankful! It is alas so rare nowadays to encounter such dedication, so much devotion.

And the story itself... This is the point of course where it gets very, very controversial and requires a lot of thought. The storyline created by Petar is woven of several small plots, united by a common thread. Petar’s character is a man with a difficult and strange destiny. Actually, is it a person? Perhaps, but maybe not. It is rather a creature, with neither sex nor age - grand, beautiful, ugly and fierce at the same time. Frankly, I haven’t seen such an uneasy emotional performance for a long time. Love, hate, indifference, perversion, desire, ignorance, sexuality, fear... It is all one, united in the character. He is a tormented soul, tormented by prejudice. Some would say he was the victim of beauty, but look deeper – he is also a killer. Aren’t we all yearning for genuine beauty, yet always end up settling for a false one? For whenever beauty requires a sacrifice from us, in most cases we end up as cowards... Aren’t we spending absurd amounts of time on the fake presentation of beauty, abandoning dignity and conscience, which should be our path towards truth? These are all universal issues that everyone can and should ask themselves, but not everyone dares for such a frank discussion with oneself. But the truth of the matter is that Petar Miloshevski – is not everyone.

Svetlana Karatanova

*Svetlana also made the subtitles for the show from English into Russian