Пирандело и българският театър: дебатът за маската
Pirandello and Bulgarian Theatre: Debating about Masks

Summary/Abstract: The article fits in with the wide range of theoretical works and studies that along with other performances and events are meant for the global celebration in 2017 of the 150th anniversary of Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936), a playwright emblematic of European theatre of the early twentieth century. The paper traces the reception of his unique trailblazing playwriting in Bulgaria, offering an in-depth analysis of the most significant theatrical productions of his works across this country. Pirandello’s dramatic works appeared first in Bulgaria between the world wars with the National Theatre’s productions of Six Characters in Search of an Author ( Sei personaggi in cerca d’autore, 1921), put on by Nikolay Massalitinov (premiered on 14 September 1926) and Right You Are if You Think You Are ( Così è (se vi pare), 1917), the directorial debut of Alexander Iconographov, who studied acting and directing in Paris (premiered on 13 January 1940). These two key productions were followed in the communist era by a rendering of Henry IV (Enrico IV, 1922) in 1970, by the company of the National Theatre once again that has gone down in the history of Bulgarian theatre due to the outstanding performance of Apostol Kareamitev in the leading role. In the period after 1989, the most striking renderings of Pirandello’s dramatic works were Krikor Azarian’s staging of Henry IV at the Theatre Bulgarian Army in 1998 (premiered on 10 April) and Tedy Moskov’s As You Desire Me (Come tu mi vuoi, 1930) at the National Theatre (premiered on 10 October 2014). The best productions of Pirandello’s dramatic works staged here during the nine decades since their earliest interpretation of 1926 have conducted, in different manners and lines, a debate about a major problem addressed in the plays, that of the mask and the face, eliciting their rich potential both for a literary philosophical theatre and theatre as a play of images.

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