Vinko Möderndorfer about the play
The Diary of Anne Frank is one of the most important texts of the 20th century. And not only because of the calamities that the Jewish people have endured, that Anne Frank's family has endured and not survived. The diary is also an important work of literature. And the little girl Anne is an exceptionally gifted observer of life and human character.
We can sense a great talent for writing in her work. Anna committed herself to writing at a very early age. It was her desire, her ambition, her joy, her talent, which she felt was her personal mission.
Reading the diary, one also wonders how many talents, how many Mozarts, Beethovens, Michelangelos... how many great writers, painters, can be killed by genocidal politics. And not only talents, but how many lives, and every life is a universe, have been lost because of the foolish hatred generated by politics. Not only in the past. Even today.
The Diary of Anne Frank is an extremely relevant work. Young and talented people are living on the brink of life and death even today. The diary of a young girl who spent two years in hiding and eventually died a horrific death as a result of betrayal will remind us that even today we are constantly living on the brink of the Holocaust. The younger generations, in particular, should be more aware of this. That is why Mini teater's decision to include this text in its theatre programme is one of the most important repertoire decisions in Slovenian theatre.
Dramatisation was a very challenging job. I wrote it from the moment Robert Waltl offered me the director's chair. I don't know how many times I read the diary before I finally found the right form of dramatisation. I tried to keep the form of the diary, despite the dialogue scenes. It was necessary to shape the dramatic scenes and at the same time to remain faithful to the impression of the characters that the young writer presented in her diary entries.
I was particularly interested in how two very different families, with three teenagers, live their hidden lives in a claustrophobic space, constantly exposed to fear for their lives.
I have extracted the most important and intense scenes from the text, where the anguish of living together and the conflicting human characters, forced into an impossible situation by hatred, are revealed. Father Otto Frank is the person who tries to maintain optimism at all costs in the increasingly nervous life of two families. Otto Frank fights against sadness, against all the ills of living together, no matter how much he himself suffers in the process. He is an extremely strong personality who can be an example of humanity and kindness in a cruel time.
In specific situations, the most ordinary things of life (washing, bathing, toileting, etc.) become the most severe ordeals. But Anna is also a very lively girl. She is cheerful, curious, witty... In the extremes of life people fight against evil and for survival also with humour. I also found this important in our dramatisation.
The Diary of Anne Frank is a vivisection of human relationships in specific circumstances. But it is also a vivisection of growing up. The birth of love. It is, in fact, the story of Romeo and Juliet at the time of the Holocaust and the European apocalypse. It is the story of how love wants to conquer death. But it is also a story of disillusionment. It is a story of fear. A story of a future stolen from millions of people.
Somewhere in her diary, Anna says: "It makes me sick to think that all those who were so close to me, my classmates, are now at the mercy of the worst rabble that ever existed. Why? Because we are different? Are we really different? Because we are all human. People who feel pain, fear, love... I don't understand, I really don't understand. What happened to the people?!"
We need to question this also today.
We must always ask ourselves questions like Anne Frank, just so perhaps history will not repeat itself in the most horrible way.
Anna's story is our story.
Are we aware enough of this?
