Scandal in the Valley of St Florian

Producer Slovensko mladinsko gledališče
Opening 6. 3. 2011 Zgornja dvorana, Slovensko mladinsko gledališče
Running time 1 hour 40 minutes. No interval.

Director Vito Taufer
Dramaturges Nebojša Pop-Tasić, Tomaž Toporišič
Music Andrej Goričar
Costume designer Barbara Stupica
Set designer Viktor Bernik
Choreographers Gregor Luštek, Rosana Hribar
Language consultant Mateja Dermelj
Lighting designer Matjaž Brišar
Sound designer Silvo Zupančič
Make-up designers Barbara Pavlin, Empera3zz
Dramaturgy assistant Anita Volčanjšek
Stage manager Janez Pavlovčič

Cast
Krištof Kobar, called Peter Blaž Šef
Jacinta Uroš Kaurin
Mayor Dario Varga
Mayor's wife Ivan Godnič
Tax collector Ivan Peternelj
Tax collector's wife Matej Recer
Postal clerk Marko Mlačnik
Teacher Šviligoj Matija Vastl
Notary Sandi Pavlin as guest
Shopkeeper Željko Hrs
Shopkeeper's wife Robert Prebil
Parish clerk Boris Kos
The Wanderer Uroš Maček
The Devil Janja Majzelj

Even today, more than one hundred years after Cankar wrote the Scandal, the work has lost none of its allure. This should be ascribed to its Dionysian character and open form, as well as Cankar's accuracy in dissecting the psychopathology of the Slovenian everyday, that of Cankar's space and time as well as our contemporary one, rendered impotent through the marriage of perverted (neo)liberalsim and provincialism. Cankar is our contemporary, because his ethics and aesthetics still resound in our minds through the essential questions he asked and the vividness of the artistic answers he embodied. Vito Taufer's staging of Cankar's "greatest mischief” about virtuous patriots from the valley of St Florian who are shocked by the scandal that has crept into their valley in the form of an artist-turned-bandit, Peter, and his muse Jacinta, is both true to the original and a radical departure from it. While it indeed adheres to Cankar's text almost from beginning to end, all roles but one are played by men, and this feature is the "indispensable driving force behind this staging,” thanks to which "nothing is as it appears to be, because everything is even truer to reality than reality itself.”