The musical-theatre play based on the Antoine de Saint-Exupéry novella The Little Prince is the second premiere title at the anniversary 70th Dubrovnik Summer Festival. As it was announced today after the children’s workshop “How Plays Are Made” by the cast and crew – led by director Hrvoje Korbar and composer Ivan Josip Skender – The Little Prince will be performed on 8, 9 and 10 August at 8.30pm in the Rector’s Palace atrium, supported by the Caboga Stiftung foundation and Tekstilpromet.
The Little Prince is a novella written by the French pilot and renowned writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in 1943, during the Second World War, as a reaction to the unconceivable and then unprecedented horrors of war. It is one of the most well-known and well-loved yet unusual literary work of our times. Read as a children’s story, a simple form, a lovely child character and delightful descriptions are found. Adults, however, see the child’s journey in the novella as a series of encounters which clearly and with acute honesty outline the symptoms of an ailing world bereft of humanity, empathy and meaning. The adults on the planets that the Little Prince visits care not for the meaning or purpose behind their actions, they merely unceasingly repeat them, going through the motions mechanically and unthinkingly. The Little Prince, on the contrary, presents a different world, a world in which children and the innate logic of their spontaneity, imagination, friendship and closeness are beacons guiding us back to our lost humanity. The wondrous world of the Little Prince is brought to life in the Rector’s Palace atrium by Livio Badurina (the Pilot / Grown-ups), Rok Juričić (the Little Prince) and Marija Kuhar Šoša (the Rose / the Fox / the Snake). The set and costumes are designed by Zdravka Ivandija Kirigin, her assistant is Ana Fucijaš, while Marko Mijatović did the lighting design.
“This project brought together artists of different backgrounds and different generations - Marija, Zdravka, Livio, Rok and Ivan – and together we embarked on an exploration of the theatrical possibilities of this work, right from the opening scene with the drawing of the boa constrictor devouring an elephant, from the position of child play and our earliest experiences of theatre,” said director Hrvoje Korbar, adding that this adaptation of the Little Prince the magic is in the music especially, music through which the Rector’s Palace turns into the desert and space, and through which one of the book’s core messages – that of seeing the unseen, that which is barely visible, of exercising the imagination – is imparted on the young audiences.
The playful character and distinctive musical expression of Ivan Josip Skender has already set some of the most captivating stories from the vaults of traditional Croatian children’s stories to music with a masterful and inventive instrumentation, through deft composing procedures. The music Skender wrote for the fantastic journey of the Little Prince through the electro-acoustic collage of sounds of the solar system which is intertwined with musical motifs that later signify individual characters and phenomena, takes us into one of the most beautiful stories ever written, a story which teaches valuable lessons to both children and (maybe even more so) adults. Under Skender’s baton, the Dubrovnik Symphony Orchestra members violinist Đana Kahriman, violist Šimun Končić, cellist Vanda Đanić, contrabassist Denis Ajduković, horn-player Toni Kursar, flutist Đive Kušelj, clarinettist Stijepo Medo, pianist Stefani Grbić, percussionist Karmen Pervitić and Ivan Končić on synthesizer will be the musical accompaniment in the performances.
Children and adults both eagerly await the play which generated a sizeable public interest and which has already been sold-out on all nights.