HOUSE OF ARTS GÖDÖLLŐ

Hosting Theatre and Cultural Centre

MÁRIA HEDRY: ILONA ZRÍNYI

Ticket price: 2600 Ft

Literature, knowledge dissemination, performers' nights

Royal Waiting Village of Gödöllő

Start of the event: 2017. 11. 15. (Wednesday) 19.00

Ilona Zrínyi: Róza Juhász

Director: Árpád Árkosi

Set design, costume: Katalin Libor

Music: Levente Rossa

Dramaturge: Edit Kulcsár

The monodrama authentically shows the versatile and exciting figure of Ilona and through her dramatic fate one of the most complicated and debated period of the Hungarian history. The main line of the play is Ilona Zrínyi’s relation to Imre Thököly and her son, Ferenc Rákóczi. She appears in this performance as an exemplary and emblematic figure as a woman, a mother and patriot and the conflicts make her human greatness congruent.

The performance can be a modern and strong play in the programme planned for the youth to strengthen national identity.

This performance is a must in the line of historical plays which use the tools of theatre to widen the historical knowledge of the audience.

The play depicts every important period of Ilona Zrínyi’s adult life. This way we witness a time journey.

In the first scene we are on a ship with Ilona Zrínyi, her entourage and Thököly heading to the last and most distant station of their exile, Asia Minor.

She is alone on the board and remembers the different stations of her life in the silence of the night. During the play we return to the ship from time to time and this scene is a framework of the performance.

Through her figure we get a picture about the political state and military events of Hungary in the 17^th century and the beginning of the ‘kurutz’ period. In her memories she recalls her father, Péter Zrínyi, the heroic soldier, who was arrested and executed by the Austrian emperor based on apocryphal accuses of treason.

We can see her at her wedding in the castle of Mukachevo and in different controversial stations of her passion towards Thököly.

The initial military successes of Imre Thököly and the occupation of the castles in Upper Hungary and the Partium made her happy and she gladly followed the love of her life into the battles. Later, after the fall, when Thököly was arrested by the Turks, she protected the castle of Mukachevo as the ‘bravest woman in Europe’.

Contemporary chronicles talk about her with enthusiasm, she was the person who protected the castle she was in charge of to the last, although she was a woman and there was no hope against the preponderance of the enemy, this way she wanted to gain honour to her country.

When she had to surrender the castle she was taken to Vienna with her children where breaking the agreement her son, Ferenc was torn away from her. Austrian treachery breaks her life for the second time. After four years Thököly ransoms her with the arrested Austrian generals and she gets the permission to follow her husband to the Turkish Empire.

Then she lived in Bulgaria, Constantinople and finally in Nicodemia wherever the ship takes her. 

The play shows the most important moments of her life to present the portrait of a remarkable character, using the tools of a drama.

The exemplary figure of Ilona Zrínyi should not be forgotten and we hope that this performance will offer a cathartic experience to both the adult audience and the youth. 

Producers: 2^nd District Cultural Public Non-profit Ltd – Klebelsberg Cultural Curation, Marczibányi Square Cultural Centre

The performance was supported by the National Cultural Fund and the Zrínyi Remembrance Committee.