Ballet

Ondrej Šoth, Zuzana Mistríková: COURAGE EVERY DAY

„Manipulation in general ischaracterized by a strategy in which someone tries to impose an opinion or even an attitude on us without us noticing. Their goal is to influence us to comply with their wishes. People manipulate others because they know that a direct, open request would likely receive a negative reaction or rejection. “(Ondrej Šoth)

In 1990, choreographer and director Ondrej Šoth staged a production “The Strange Pleasure of Living” at the Ballet of the Slovak National Theatre in Bratislava. Music for the performance was composed by a member of the legendary Czech rockband Pražský výběr and one of the mostsignificant figuresin contemporary Czech music, Michal Pavlíček. The theme of the production was demagogy and manipulation in allforms of society, but also the ability of individuals to remain true to themselves in a twisted society, thanks to the strength provided by faith, hope and love. The creative team returned to thistheme after 12 years. During that time, the most significantfigures -composer M. Pavlíček and choreographer O. Šoth- matured creatively, and in collaboration with stage designer Juraj Fábry, costume designer Zuzana Lacková-Gilhuus and dramaturge Zuzana Mistríková, they developed a new perspective on the subject in a production of the Ballet of the State Theatre Košice, titled “The Strange Pleasure of Living II”.

We live life utilitarianly and mostly evaluate it pragmatically. Nobody is so well that they do not need something, and nobody is so unfortunate that they do not fear losing something. And when a person rebels against something, friends, parents and others admonish them.There areenough reasons for a person to eventually feel abandoned and cowardly. We will be torn from life because we were afraid, disregarded our dignity, and did not care about the dignity of others in work and in life, and because we lacked the courage to question and rediscover. Because we did not value truth,  freedom and justice enough.

The central motif of the new adaptation is faith, hope and love. Today's world is a world of information and media. The boundaries between "good" and "evil", "manipulators" and "manipulated", have become very thin and hard to distinguish, especially for inexperienced viewers drowning in a flood of new forms of information and genres, citizens who are still learning to use their "citizenship" and understand it in the sense of freedom. Freedom does not just mean liberty in all possible interpretations of this word (we could justify any individual´s actionregardless of their consequences). Freedom primarily means responsibility - for ourselves and for the environment in which we exist. It involves the ability to perceive the consequences of our actions. True freedom is not possible without moral criteria. These criteria are not easilysought today. The world seems to increasingly appreciate lies and superficiality. Values seem to lose meaning. The outcome is a loss of illusions, nihilism and helplessness. In spite of that, the only way out for us, just as for the characters in the new production of the Ballet of the National Theatre Košice, “Courage Every Day, Strange Pleasure of Living III.” - is probably not to give up the search for moral criteria of freedom.