Čechov, Pietor, Shakespeare, Kukura: normalizačný Platonov (SND, 1979)
Chekhov, Pietor, Shakespeare, and Kukura: Normalising Platonov (SND, 1979)

Summary/Abstract: The 1979 premiere of Anton Pavlovich Chekhov’s Platonov at the Slovak National Theatre took place during the period of Normalisation in Czechoslovakia, which extinguished hopes for the reform of Soviet-style socialism. Normalisation brought the suppression of intellectual freedom and renewed ideological restrictions. Nevertheless, theatre found ways to circumvent many of these constraints and articulate critical views, paradoxically even through productions of Russian classical drama. Director Miloš Pietor was one of the leading figures of Slovak theatre and an expert on Chekhov. His production of Platonov became the first staging of the world-renowned playwright’s early drama in Slovakia. It resonated as a generational statement by those in their thirties and forties, expressing a sense of frustration with life under so-called real socialism. A retrospective analysis of this production makes it possible to examine the event in several contexts: as part of the Slovak tradition of interpreting Chekhov, as a testimony to theatre during the period of Normalisation, and as an example of the interweaving of Chekhovian and Shakespearean motifs in the directorial work of Miloš Pietor.

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