Written in the 1980s, The Idiot is an adaptation of the novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky. A citation of an international jury of music journalists praised Warlikowski’s production, saying: “A political piece, the final of seven operas by a composer who, along with his œuvre, came close to being forgotten in the maelstrom of 20th-century catastrophes [...] Krzysztof Warlikowski staged this parable in a shockingly dense manner on a horizontally movable space, perfect for arranging parallel scenes of simultaneous events.”
The citation added: “The actions of the top-rate cast were breathtakingly true to life, conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla’s identification with the score compellingly poetic. Yes, this is exactly what festivals should be doing – recovering lost masterpieces for the repertoire: like Mieczysław Weinberg’s The Idiot at the Salzburg Festival.”
Born in Warsaw in 1909, Weinberg was a Polish Jew who escaped the Nazis by fleeing into the Soviet Union. In 1943 he settled in Moscow, where he worked as a composer and pianist.
In 1953, he was arrested as part of Stalin’s anti-Semitic purges, but was released after Stalin’s death thanks to support from his close friend Dmitri Shostakovich. He died in Moscow in 1996, leaving a vast output of over twenty symphonies, 17 string quartets, six operas, chamber music for various instruments and songs.
Warlikowski, 63, has to his credit highly acclaimed productions of Shakespeare, Greek tragedies and plays by modern authors, all co-produced with leading European companies and festivals, including the Odéon Théâtre de l’Europe in Paris, Festival d’Avignon, Greek Festival in Athens, and Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie de Bruxelles. Many of them have been presented in Edinburgh, Vienna, South Korea and China.
In addition to Salzburg, Warlikowski has also directed operas by Mozart, Wagner, Shostakovich, Bartok and Berg in Brussels, Paris, Madrid, Munich, and London.
Several years ago, he received the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in Theatre from the Venice Biennale.
(mk)