29-5-11
Hotel Royal, Belgrade
We got up fairly early this morning…probably only four hours of sleep, but it was damn worth it. We walked to the train station where we met up with Katie again. We got on the train to Novi Sad and I promptly fell asleep for the two-hour train ride. When we got there, we travelled near to the Theatre and a large Catholic Church. We had some coffee there while we waited around to head to Petrovardin for lunch.
We got on a bus and travelled about eight blocks to a bridge, crossed it, and got off. We climbed up hill towards the fortress on top. Our restaurant was located on a beautiful terrace overlooking part of the river and the city proper. It was a nice Italianesque restaurant – a sort of Serbo-Italian crossover. It was good.
After Lunch we climbed up about another twenty or thirty feet to the top of the fortress. We enquired about tours through the catacombs and were told it was three-hundred dinar a person. A little under half the group decided they didn’t want to go…so we left them there. We had about a twenty minute wait until the tours, so we briefly explored the museum attached. It’s a shame they didn’t have a map of the fortress for sale – I would have loved to give that to Peter, in addition to Kalemegdan, for DnD inspiration.
I young guide came and met us soon enough and led us in our descent to the tunnels of Petrovardin. The guard reached his arm through a barred iron door and unlocked it from the inside. We walked in and found…drum-roll please…a full scale map of the fortress…. It’s annoying how easy that would be to reproduce and sell. Anyways, he asked if anyone was claustrophobic before we went down – there was no exit before the end of the tour a kilometer away. We weren’t, he led, he talked – we listened. He showed us various aspects of life underground include sleeping areas, provision chutes, the entrances to mine holes – throughout the fortress were trenches to prevent front assaults, they were guarded by rifle holes, canon holes, and little crawlspaces to rooms below the trenches which were filled with gunpowder, ready to be exploded if too many enemies penetrated to that point in the trench – a number of openings for weapons to slide through, traps throughout the walls – soldiers would hide in these rooms and shoot through rifle-holes if the enemy breached the tunnels – and other similar places. It was really an interesting experience, though I wish I could have explored more. It looked like previous the space had been open to the public to just browse through – there were plaques on the walls explaining everything in Serbian, German, and English – but after some tunnels collapsed I believe they moved to only allowing tours to be in the tunnels.
As we exited the tunnels, the guide informed us that this was where the Exit Festival – which starts just days after we leave – was held in the trenches of the fortress.
We began the descent of the fortress. When we had reached the level of houses again, we saw a group of men standing around what looking to be a professional film camera. We inquired as to what was going on – apparently they were filming a commercial for Exit Festival! The guy we asked, who also seemed to be in charge, asked us if we would like to help them. We didn’t have any time constraints, so we did. It was a lot of fun, though also a laborious process – I now know why people complain about film taking quite a bit of time. After about four or five takes, we finished up and continued back towards the other side of the bridge and the theatre.
We were seeing Barbelo by Biljana Srbljanović – the same lady who also wrote Locusts. The first you notice as the play begins that the characters are speaking French while Serbian “subtitles” projected above the stage. The set was very interesting. It had two main components – a vertical turntable, two stories in height. The center of the turntable had been cut out to allow actors to utilize the space. From out edge to inner edge, the wheel was probably about five feet wide. Additionally, there was a long box, probably 6’ x 6’ x 20’, on smart casters which allowed it to be used for a variety of purposes including as a table, ramp, runway, or platform.
While the scenic design was very strong, the lighting and sound lagged behind. Both were riddled with some poor choices, in my opinion. Often the gobos or choices of what lights to use made it very difficult to see the actors face, which in turn made it difficult to observe any facial expressions – an especially poor choice considering Barbelo was a Serbian play being performed in the French language to an audience of Serbians with subtitles forty feet in the air…. There needed to be some way to follow the arc of the story and the primary way left to the audience facial expressions, which the lighting took away. Doesn’t work out so well. On the other hand, the sound clips were often louder than they needed to be, and would fade in and out quite abruptly. It was jarring and took me out of the moment.
That being said, there were some very nice effects in the show. The most impressive to me was when it rained. Half of the turntable was rigged with a hole-poked hose of some sort which they pumped water through to make it rain. The coolest part about it though was it only rain inside the circle – no where outside had water. In addition to the falling water, the designers utilized a nice lighting effect – a high white light, angled just slightly to stage left – that made the rain glisten and sparkle as it fell upon the woman. A fantastic composition.
After Barbelo, waited for awhile at a bar until it was about time to catch our bus back to Belgrade and sweet, sweet sleep.
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