Last year’s hit play Marin Držić - Victory Over the Enemies will be the part of the 69th Dubrovnik Summer Festival from 20 to 23 of July with one great addition this year – it will be subtitled in English. The play will take place at the Art School Park every night at 9:30.
The play revolves around the life, work, and destiny of the great Renaissance playwright Marin Držić, whose 450th anniversary of death we mark this year. The dramaturgical concept and text adaptation for the play was made by Hrvoje Ivanković. With equal portions of facts, assumptions, and fantasy, the play ludically explores Marin Držić's relation with his contemporaries, and with ethical and social paradigms of his time. Držić himself is in this play both as a play-writer and a character from his plays. The play follows Držić's life path which is revived on set by fragments of his works. The director of the play Ivica Boban is one of the most important Croatian modern theatre authors. She has previously and successfully staged the works of Marin Držić three times at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival. Her play entitled Play Držić in 1978 was the first play created by the technique of postmodern patchwork that told the story of Držić's life in his own words. Her stagings of Marin Držić's tragedy Hecuba in both 1982 and 1991 are considered anthological.
The ensemble consists of mostly young actors, some of whom are still students at the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb (Petra Svrtan, Iva Kraljević, Ivana Gulin, Robert Španić, Marin Klišmanić, Ugo Korani and Josip Brakus). The cast is lead by five more experienced actors: Maro Martinović, Branimir Vidić – Flika, Doris Šarić Kukuljica, Danijel Ljuboja and Ozren Grabarić who plays Držić himself as some of Držić's most important characters. The drama ensemble also includes Jure Radnić, Romano Nikolić, Mateo Videk, Nika Lasić and Glorija Dubelj and the members of the Kolarin Company of Actors from Dubrovnik Jelica Čučević, Marinka Metković, Aida Machiedo, Tajana Martić, Ante Tonći Đurković, Barbara Lončarić Lučić and Matija Vojvodić. Alongside the author of the dramaturgical concept and text adaptation Hrvoje Ivanković and director and author of the dramaturgical adaptation Ivica Boban, the team also includes Miljenko Sekulić who is the designer of the set, masks and puppets, costume designer Doris Kristić and composer Ozren Glaser. The lighting designer is Vesna Kolarec, video screenings were made by Ivan Lušičić, the choreographer is Nikolina Medak and the fencing teacher was Lovro Buva.
