TIRANA, Sept. 15 – A premiere black comedy by English playwright Shelagh Stephenson has opened the new season at the National Theatre following the summer break.
“The Memory of Water” which earned the British playwright and actress the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Comedy in 1996 made its premiere this week in a show directed by Albania’s Rozi Kostani and starring veteran actors Rajmonda Bulku, Violeta Trebicka and Neritan Lià§aj.
The comedy’s title refers to homeopathy – the way water “remembers” healing properties. Stephenson suggests our brains work similarly, saving what they need to keep us going.
“Shelagh Stephenson’s 1996 debut – named best new comedy at the Oliviers – is rather wise; wiser, certainly, than the subsequent film version, Before You Go. Yes, it’s larger than life and slightly knockabout, spiced with enough weed and whisky to draw out both laughs and recriminations but Stephenson spins a delicate treatise on human nature with gentleness and precision,” writes The Guardian.
Director Kostani says that what makes this comedy special and intriguing is the mixture of comedy and tragedy.
“The directorial concept will further convey the work’s message and provide greater coherence adapting it for the Albanian public,” says the director.
Three estranged sisters meet on the eve of their mother’s funeral to argue and misremember in Shelagh Stephenson’s examination of the structures of memory and family.
The comedy will also stage on Sept. 16, 17, 18 night at the National Theatre after its Sept. 15 premiere.
