Обрати и дилеми на режисьорския театър в България през първото десетилетие след Втората световна война
Turns and Dilemmas of Di​rector’s Theatre in Bulgaria in the First Decade after WW2

Summary/Abstract: The defining periods in the development of director’s theatre in Bulgaria are especially important to its overall and precise comprehension: the 1920s, when it emerged and established itself; the first decade after the World War Two, when the entire Bulgarian theatre was programmatically transformed into director’s, and the recent two decades and a half, characterised by an intensive process of substantial changes in director’s status that led to overcoming the single model of director’s theatre and the advent of actual dramatic forms and aesthetics, including the directorial figure in the staging of a production in a new way. This article deals with the second of the said three periods, tracing the process of the programmatic transformation of Bulgarian theatre into director’s theatre following the political turn of the mid-1940s. That transformation was a key tool of the emergent communist state for a rapid, unconditional, and correct imposition of the theatre of Socialist Realism. To implement its project of an ‘ideologically right’ theatre, the communist authorities needed particular individuals that would endeavour to materialise it immediately. Owing to the crucial function of the sole shaper of a performance fulfilled by the director in the modern development of European theatre, director proved to be eminently suitable for being assigned the role of such an individual, after, of course, receiving the necessary training. The beneficial effect of this programmatic transformation of Bulgarian theatre into entirely director’s one in about the mid-1950s was its fast professionalisation as a whole. The negative one was the ideologization, unification, and formalisation of stage practices and audience perceptions. Thus,​ directors became the most powerful and significant figures at theatre, being though at the same time the most dependent, controlled and sanctioned for their departures from the imposed Socialist-Realist canon.

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