Yorick Studio's aim is to bring new colour to Hungarian cultural life in Târgu-Mureş, and even further afield, with a new, bolder kind of theatre thought. They believe that the audience can and must be educated, and that the audience is open to that which is new and different. This is why they plan on giving performances for small audiences or in unconventional spaces, through which they set themselves the main goal of renewing traditional or obsolete theatrical language. In their performances they aim to provide ample room for EXPERIMENTING. In the interest of achieving as many of their goals as possible, they wish to work and think together primarily with young artists, actors, directors and plastic artists.
The performance approaches, by the specific means of theatre, Romanian-Hungarian social co-existence, bilingualism, human situations and conflicts arising from them, and in particular the ethnic riots of 20 March 1990. The ensemble of Yorick Studio (5 Romanian actors, 5 Hungarian actors, a Romanian director/playwright, a Hungarian dramaturg and a Romanian visual artist) appealed to the town to co-author the performance: the starting point was personal interviews with more than fifty inhabitants of Târgu-Mureş who either directly participated in the events, or whose lives were affected by them. Stories, memories, mythology, and also today's view of those events furnished the actors with material for improvisations and for the original scenario of the play. It is not documentary theatre, but a performance that uses documentation to build fictional situations. 20/20 tries to use the distance of today, treating the subject with lots of humour, the black humour of absurd and surreal situations. It is a show about the nineties in Romania, and how things have evolved since then, both in reality and in our memories.
The title – 20/20 – does not only refer to 20 March and the twenty years that have passed since then. In ophthalmology this number means a healthy sharpness of vision. The performance at Yorick wishes to see the theme and to make it seen, so that we may discuss it either in our mother tongue or any other language. That is why the Romanian and Hungarian actors in the cast sometimes falteringly address each other in their own or the others’ language. With more or less success, according to their skills.
Players: Radu Iacoban, Barna Bányai Kelemen, Katalin Berekméri, Paula Gherghe, Mădălina Ghiţescu, András Korpos, Rolando Matsangos, Aba Sebestyén, Cristina Toma, Klára Tompa
Stage design: Maria Drăghici
Script, director: Gianina Cărbunariu