Attila Vidnyánszky became one of the defining figures of twenty-first-century Hungarian theatre under the influence of two countries and two theatrical cultures. Born in Transcarpathia as a member of a minority community, he developed a profound knowledge of – and deep attachment to – the Hungarian language and culture. It is therefore no coincidence that he first earned a teaching degree in History and Hungarian language and literature. Together with his pupils, he founded a school theatre group and staged, among other works, Frigyes Karinthy’s Tanár úr kérem (Please, Sir) as well as ballads by János Arany, adapted for the stage by the group themselves. His studies in Kyiv exposed him to the strong traditions of Russian theatre. With the support of a university tutor, he spent three months in Moscow and one month each in Georgia, Lithuania and Leningrad. During this period, he became acquainted, among others, with the work of the Lithuanian director Eimuntas Nekrošius and the Russian director Anatoly Vasiliev. With the latter he developed a close professional relationship that later evolved into a friendship. It was perhaps precisely this dual inspiration – the combined impact of Hungarian and Russian theatre – that shaped him into a theatre-maker with an individual vision and a distinctive stage language. Although he was invited to Kyiv at a time when the studio theatre movement was flourishing there – at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s more than forty such companies were active – he chose Beregszász (Berehove) instead, where circumstances recalled the era of Hungarian itinerant theatre. Almost everything had to be built from scratch. There was no theatre building and no company. Through persistent effort, he travelled the villages of Transcarpathia to recruit young people interested in theatre. One of the most decisive figures of his company, Zsolt Trill, also became an actor in this way, despite never having been to the theatre before. In 1993, within the framework of Ukrainian–Hungarian cooperation, the first Hungarian acting class graduated in Kyiv; its members went on to become the founding actors of the Berehove theatre. The kind of creative workshop practice through which he prepared his productions at that time, shaping them over months if necessary, was not entirely unknown in Hungary either. There, however, it was more characteristic of smaller studio theatres and, in the best sense, amateur companies. His working methods and theatrical worldview did not change significantly during his years in Debrecen or later at the National Theatre.
As he has frequently emphasised, he always begins his work with the text of the play. In the early period he did not even rely on a dramaturg, since rehearsal processes in Beregszász (Berehove) were longer and allowed him time to read everything that might be necessary for creating the performance text. For him this was the most important preparatory phase, as this solitary work established the concept of the future production. He did not make conventional notes; instead, he inserted slips of paper into the text, occasionally incorporating fragments from other works by the same author or pairing entirely different texts with the original. In this way he created what he himself termed a “fragment dramaturgy”. For him, the text is not a closed dramatic construction but merely a foundation, in which causality is not paramount; rather, he seeks, in a postmodern manner, to evoke the globality and complexity of the world. This concept continues to inform his work to this day.
One physical realisation of this seemingly complex dramaturgical vision is the simultaneous stage. Contemporary audiences are affected by stimuli arriving from multiple directions at the same time. The director and his regular set-design collaborator – in recent years almost exclusively Olekszandr Bilozub – attempt to recreate this complex experience on stage. When this kind of simultaneity functions effectively, actions unfolding on several planes simultaneously reinforce one another and, at a given moment, converge to exert a unified impact on the spectator. Closely linked to this is the concept of poetic theatre. Vidnyánszky believes that theatre must address essential matters and convey profound emotions; entertainment alone is not a sufficient goal. Poetic theatre does not abandon reality but occasionally transcends it, returning to a qualitatively different reality that offers perspective and reveals alternative possibilities of existence. It encourages spectators to sense, from time to time, the presence of God or spirit in everyday life and to undergo a process of purification. This is how Attila Vidnyánszky interprets the sacrality of theatre and the stage. He also considers it important to reconnect with the roots of Hungarian folk culture, which strengthen identity and faith.
His relationship with actors is similarly distinctive. He is deeply loyal to his collaborators, and the workshop work carried out together continues the solitary preparatory process through which he conceptualises the structure of the work. Within the basic concept, actors’ ideas and their interpretations of roles are integrated collectively. This collaborative method was especially characteristic of the Beregszász (Berehove) period, when the company spent almost twenty-four hours a day together. Based on the Stanislavski method, and through the acquisition and daily application of various concentration exercises requiring physical and mental focus, actors achieved a state of constant, intense presence on stage. At that time, rehearsal processes lasting several months were possible, allowing scenes and situations to be interpreted in multiple ways and fully developed. The completion of a production did not end with the premiere. Performances often remained in the repertoire for years or even decades, during which time they were repeatedly revised. These were not mere revivals but occasions for exploring new interpretative possibilities. Instead of reproduction, rearticulation took place – a continuation of the creative process. One such production was Samuel Beckett’s Godot-ra várva (Waiting for Godot), which, following its 1994 premiere in Beregszász (Berehove), was still performed in 2005 with the same cast. According to the director, the key issue in this production was the absence of redemption and abandonment by God. Vladimir (Zsolt Trill) and Estragon (Nelli Szűcs), Man and Woman, search in vain for the possibility of salvation. This was Vidnyánszky’s second production in Beregszász (Berehove), and his unmistakable directorial toolkit was already clearly recognisable. In addition to the aforementioned text structuring and the actors’ constant, intense physical and spiritual presence, the emphasised role of stage music and an original spatial organisation carrying autonomous meaning were characteristic features. These tools would become even more pronounced in later productions. This is evident, for example, in his staging of Szilárd Borbély’s Halotti pompa (lit. Funeral Splendour). The work addresses the robbery and murder that took place at Christmas 2000, in which the author’s mother was killed. The production was primarily based on Borbély’s texts: the Nativity mystery play Míg alszik szívünk Jézuskája (lit. While Our Little Jesus Sleeps), the poetry collection Halotti pompa (lit. Funeral Splendour), and excerpts from the essay volume Egy gyilkosság mellékszálai (lit. Side Threads of a Murder). The text compiled by Attila Vidnyánszky and his dramaturg collaborator Zsófia Rideg also incorporated excerpts from police interrogation records and autopsy reports, folk lament songs and sequences from the Halotti Beszéd (lit. Funeral Sermon). The powerful impact of the text was further intensified by the swirling dances choreographed by Oleg Zhukovsky and by the use of the simultaneous stage. In the foreground of the stage, an elderly couple is seen preparing for Christmas: the man fixes the Christmas tree into its stand, while the woman cuts out pastries. Meanwhile, in the background, next to a large stylised puppet, the mortician speaks about the stages of the decomposition of the dead body. Prose and verse fragments, dance and increasingly oppressive music (composed by István Pál) heighten the swirling vision, which grows into a kind of danse macabre that overwhelms the audience. The turning point of the performance is the murder itself. From this moment on, the concrete narrative thread gradually disappears. The final factual detail is that the suspects were acquitted for lack of evidence – thus the crime is not followed by punishment. In the second part of the performance, violent death appears as a symbol, from the murder of Cain through the death of Jesus to the Holocaust, thereby broadening the theme of murder and victimhood. In this world, the meaning of sacrifice is called into question, and, as in Godot-ra várva (Waiting for Godot), waiting for redemption or resurrection proves futile. Both the performers and the director stated that this was not a simple production: they all experienced the rehearsal process as profoundly transformative, reshaping their relationship to life and death.
In terms of stage imagery and poetic quality, the 2010 production Mesés férfiak szárnyakkal (Fabulous Men with Wings), created by Oleg Zhukovsky, Miklós Szénási and Ödön Lénárt, also deserves mention when outlining the director’s oeuvre. Here too, the story does not unfold along a single line; there is no linear progression, only a sequence of loosely connected episodes. Alongside the history of flight, beginning with Daedalus and Icarus and continuing with Leonardo da Vinci, the heroic era of Soviet space exploration appears, with its most important figure, Yuri Gagarin, and above all the visionary scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. This narrative strand intertwines with a Slavic religious framing story that prophesies, in addition to the biblical Three Kings, the arrival of a fourth, Russian king. He arrives too late and, as revealed by the end of the play, reaches not Bethlehem but Golgotha, in time for the crucifixion of Jesus. As a third strand, the figure of a mythical Russian painter appears intermittently. The text is again intertextual: alongside scientific treatises, it incorporates quotations from Mihály Vörösmarty, Imre Madách and Attila József, as well as the lyrics of the song Bunkócska. Stylistically, Slavic mysticism is combined with early scientific rationalism, parody of socialist realism and satire of Stalinist ideology. The visual world (with set design once again by Olekszandr Bilozub) holds the audience spellbound: the stage picture is formed by Leonardo da Vinci’s enormous flying machine model, complemented by various moving devices and technical curiosities. Since the auditorium itself is built onto a revolving stage, the spectacle becomes even more mobile, constantly rotating before the audience and keeping their attention alert. Actor direction is unified here as well. As in all Vidnyánszky productions, the emphasis is on teamwork – the joy of collective creation is the principal strength of the performance.
As Manager of the National Theatre, he may direct somewhat less frequently, yet through his choice of repertoire and the directors he invites, he ensures the high artistic standard of the country’s foremost theatre. The repertoire primarily features works by classical Hungarian authors (Áron Tamási, Gergely Csiky, Miklós Bánffy, Gyula Krúdy) and international playwrights (William Shakespeare, Henrik Ibsen, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, Bertolt Brecht, Edmond Rostand). In recent years, directors working at the National Theatre have included Elemér Kincses, Sándor Zsótér, Yvette Bozsik, Silviu Purcărete, David Doiashvili and Viktor Ryzhakov.
Finally, it should be noted that in 2011 he also returned to teaching. He is the head and a professor of the Institute of Theatre Arts at the University of Kaposvár. In this respect, he follows the tradition of earlier great directors such as Wojciech Bogusławski, Max Reinhardt and Antal Németh, whose contribution to theatre encompassed not only artistic creation but also the education and shaping of future generations.