Galery

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21 years after his death John Cassavetes continues to scandalize the American art critics. The script writer, actor, director and the first in the history of cinema independent producer, who proves that good quality movies could be made outside Hollywood and that the artist can personally finance and publicize his movies, this time captured the attention of director Doris Mirescu. 

Mirescu is putting the famous Cassavetes’ movie “Husbands” on the stage of the New York’s Public Theater in a manner corresponding to the philosophy of the great director with Greek origin – to always look for the rejection of the traditional methods of telling a story. The movie, made in 1970, in which Cassavetes shines in the part of Gas is to a great extent an improvisation. It tells the story of three middle aged New Yorkers who, shocked by the death of a friend of theirs, are desperately seeking the meaning of their life with the help of alcohol, throwing up, chasing of women, music, hazard and wild life. There is no story, instead there is a deep examination of the characters of the thee men, who want to forget at least for a while their “official” life and get into thoughts about life.

Their drama or tragic comedy was told by Cassavetes without sparing anything to the spectators, realistic and naturalistic for two and a half hours. Doris Mirescu goes even further. Her play is three whole hours and as New York Times writes “it is much more interesting to talk about it than to watch it”. The director puts her characters in three glass rooms and surrounds them with cameras whose images we see in a number of screens on the stage. Practically there is no line or mimic of the actors that we don’t see from up close on one of the screens. No matter if they are laying on the couches, reading books or watching a movie of Cassavetes on the television. The multimedia show is in most cases unusual, however New York Times describes it as “chaotic and provoking yawning”.

Doris Mirescu herself was born in Romania, but she leaves in her early childhood along with her parents. She gets to know the movies Cassavetes in Paris as a literature student in the Sorbonne. “His movies changed my life. Before them I have never understood cinema. His movies are mostly about men and this attracts me very much - to understand the inside world of the men”, says the director for New York Times.