Dr Paul Murray: I love chaos and anarchy in the theatre

Dr. Paul Murray: Theatre Can Change People PHOTO: Marko Divjak

I don’t feel like a stranger in Belgrade. Sometimes it seems that only madmen have the courage to say what they think. Everything around us is a performance

Dr Paul Leonard Murray, an actor, theatre director and pedagogue, is a Brit who has been living and working in Belgrade for the past 18 years, since becoming a Serbian son-in-law. He was educated in the UK and worked in theatre and film, as well as a university professor in Winchester, where he previously earned a PhD in applied theatre.

These days he is preparing his first production as a director, which will premiere at the Madlenianum Theatre. The play is based on a text by the American playwright of Polish descent Adam Szymkowicz, New Love. Alongside Paul, the production includes Gordon Murray as his assistant and American artist Vicky Page, who is responsible for set and costume design. The play will be performed in English, with Serbian subtitles.

It is a witty story about two young actors who, caught in a whirlwind of ambitions and emotions, try to find the right balance between love and career. The roles are played by Boris Lukman and Coral Mizrahi.

How did you become involved in this project?

- About six months ago I ran a workshop with a group of young actors, and one of them, Coral, asked me to direct a play for her and her partner. They had found a new play by Adam Szymkowicz. I said I would be delighted. I hadn’t worked as a professional theatre director for a long time, and I thought it would be nice to return to theatre, but I only wanted to direct, not deal with the whole burden of other production responsibilities. Coral and Boris approached the Madlenianum, and the response was positive - they approved the small stage and provided full technical support. They are very professional, and I’m pleased with the collaboration. They were very helpful. After the premiere on December 16, New Love will be performed once a month throughout the coming year. Commencing on the 22nd of December and again on the 16^th of January.

With this experience, can you compare working in theatre in Serbia with how things work in England?

- I can’t really compare, because I worked in theatre in England a very long time ago. My friend Gordon Murray, who is the assistant on this production, said that everything is in line with the standards of that type of theatre in England - there is no major difference.

How closely do you follow the work of Serbian theatres, especially in Belgrade?

- Not as closely as I should. I mostly follow things through my  brother-in-law, Pavle, who acts at the Belgrade Drama Theatre. I’ve seen Pavle’s productions, including 1984. I work a lot with actors on the TV series I’m involved in, many of whom come from different theatres in Serbia, so through them I find out what’s being done.

Did you have a chance to get to know Atelje 212 and their work?

- Very little. I’ve had conversations with Ivan Jeftović; we’ve worked together on a few things and we’re talking about a possible future project, so we’ll see.

Will you be doing anything else at the Madlenianum?

- I don’t know. I’d like to direct another play in any theatre.

Your life story is very interesting. Where did you grow up, and what was your childhood like?

- When I was little, we moved around a lot. My parents worked for the Salvation Army. It’s a Christian humanitarian organization whose mission is to help poor and vulnerable people. The policy and practice of the organization were to relocate its staff to a different city or place every year. Most large cities have branches of the organization, and my parents ran one of those branches. They worked on social programs, and from my birth until I was nine years old, we moved to a different place every year.

Which place did you like the most?

- I don’t remember all those places. The first one I clearly remember is Glasgow in Scotland. I first spoke with a strong Scottish accent. Later, when we moved to England, I realized the difference between my way of speaking and the other children, who had a much softer English accent. I didn’t want to stand out, so I adapted to the English accent. I can say that this was my first acting experience, prompted by the need to fit in, and I taught myself how to change my accent and tonality.

Paul Murray: I Feel Calm in Belgrade  PHOTO: Marko Divjak

How did your parents, as Christian activists, react to your choice of acting as a profession?

- They supported me, but they were worried about how I would earn a living. At university we studied acting, but we also wrote and directed, so my mother was happy - and my parents in general were satisfied -believing that this gave me more options. At our faculty, education isn’t focused only on acting; you study and practice a variety of things, including making theatre with non-professionals and the under-represented. I think my work I this field was partly a legacy of my upbringing.

Which authors influenced you the most during your education?

- My first teacher, Richard Smith, was very important to me; he really sparked my interest in acting when I was 14. I have always liked Bertolt Brecht. Besides them, I was particularly drawn to a small group whose members were all clowns - they were called Kaboodle. They performed in the street, anywhere, adapting various plays, and they were serious and unserious at the same time. They were a bit chaotic, crazy even, and I loved that, because theatre in England can be quite formal, serious and class-based. I liked the idea of playing with that seriousness.

It seems you moved beyond that sense of “playfulness,” since you continued your education and ended up with a PhD?

- I did various projects in England and worked in different institutions - there were children with autism, prisoners, people in psychiatric hospitals. I loved making theatre with people who weren’t actors, doing something close to drama therapy, but more political. I worked with groups in prison and in a hospital there that’s similar to Laza Lazarević here. And I really liked it. It was anarchic and chaotic to make theatre with them, precisely because everything ends up being chaotic - those people can’t do everything that trained actors can, but they can do other things, and that mix was fascinating to me. I ran workshops with them and sometimes performances as well. Everything was original: they came up with the scenes themselves and performed them; it wasn’t based on any existing text. I liked that because those people brought a certain chaos into theatre, and I found that extremely interesting and inspiring.

How well were they able to convey the story?

- There were always some complications. One of my first jobs in this area was working with four women who had various mental health diagnoses and had been in the treatment system for about 20 years at that point. At the time, I thought they were very old, but in reality they were probably around 50 and probably even younger than I am now.

The performance with them was very successful. Initially, it wasn’t planned as a staged production, but they really wanted to do it. The theme was the mental health treatment system, which was disastrous in many ways at that time. They insisted on creating a play to show how terrible their experience in the hospital had been, and they wanted the performance to be seen by psychiatrists. They lived in their own homes but were still part of the treatment system, going daily to a day center where they were “treated.” Ana, one of them, had agoraphobia. Every morning, she had to rush into a car, park right at the hospital entrance, and run inside.

After some time of workshops and developing the play together, they told me they wanted to go on tour. We knew that it would be challenging, especially for Ana because of her agoraphobia. She said, “No problem, we’ll manage.” And off we went. The rides were fine, but once we drove to another medical center for psychiatric trainings, and it was impossible to park right at the entrance. We had to take coats and spread them around Ana so she could get out of the car, walk around 5 minutes and enter the building - making it look as if we were escorting a famous person, like Elvis or someone similar. Once inside, everything was fine. That was one impractical complication we faced.

Did their performances have an audience?

- Yes. The four women really wanted to show how harsh the mental health treatment system was. As part of a training program for psychiatrists we had an opportunity to present this performance to them. After watching the play, the doctors said they felt more like the patients in the show than the doctors, that their work was stressful and exhausting for them, and that the mental health system was awful and unpleasant even from their perspective.

Later, they performed in Manchester. After the play, everyone stayed for a presentation. In the hall of about 500 people, there was a very well-known dramatist who had come from Brazil for the occasion. During his talk, he explained his model of theatre as the best approach, where, according to him, everyone should give advice to people with mental illness. The idea was to create a play through which advice could be shared with patients by anyone - and he came to see our performance.

The four women in our play didn’t know who he was or that he was there. When he shared his ideas, Ana - the woman with agoraphobia -disagreed. She stood up, asked to speak, and said: “Excuse me, I don’t agree with that.” Everyone looked at her, wide-eyed and shocked, because he was considered an institution and an authority. People whispered, “How dare she? Sit down.” But she explained why she disagreed. I don’t remember exactly what she said, but it was very articulate and well-spoken. After that, everyone applauded her. People came up to congratulate her and said they felt the same but didn’t dare to speak because everyone would call them crazy. She said, “I am crazy, and that’s why I can say it.” They admired her courage to speak her mind. Everyone considered that she was actually the real expert in that room.

From that moment, I realized - this small, seemingly insignificant woman had spoken and caused a stir. That is the chaos and anarchy I love in theatre. I wondered how she found the confidence to stand up and speak in front of all those people, given that she had lived alone in her house for 20 years and didn’t even dare to leave it. She explained to me that she could do it because of theatre. This was the theme I explored in my PhD: how theatre gives people the confidence to do things like that.

After all those jobs in England, you left everything and came to Belgrade. What was your first impression of the city?

- Before coming to Belgrade, I had lived in the United States for two years, from age 35 to 37. Even though we spoke the same language, I really felt like a foreigner there. Here, everything somehow felt familiar - the Serbian sense of humor is similar to the British. People are focused on family, on friendships… I experienced it as all the good things from England in one place. I don’t feel like a stranger. Of course, there’s the climate too. I felt calm from the very first day. Here I’ve lived the longest in my life; I had never lived more than three years in one place before, and now it’s been 18 years.

Did you miss the work you left behind in England?

- No. Before moving to Belgrade, I had a university job as a professor, which I got after completing my PhD. I had already been working there for a year. I asked for advice my PhD mentor, who was now my colleague, about relocating to Serbia, to Belgrade. I asked him if it was crazy. He told me: “Go, go immediately.” At the time, there were some problems at the university, and he had a rather pessimistic view. He said I should follow my heart. So it was an easy decision. It would have been harder to stay, knowing I had some opportunities in Belgrade. That’s how I came to Belgrade. He even came with me for a week to see how it was here.

Your first job in Belgrade was working with children at the Children’s Cultural Center. How did that idea come about?

- A year before I moved, I visited Belgrade and held a workshop with children at the Children’s Cultural Center. Timothy John Byford was also there at the time. In the end, everyone was pleased and told me: “We know this will probably never happen, but if you ever come to live in Belgrade, you can run workshops at DKC.” At the time, I had no plans to move here. When I finally moved, it was May, and I had enough money to live for a year. I told my wife I didn’t know what to do. She asked, “Why not run workshops for children?” I asked her, “Who would even want to come to such workshops?” Still, I contacted the people at DKC, reminding them of their promise. They said, “Of course, yes, yes.” In the very first season, I had 40 children participating and working with me. That’s how BELT - Belgrade English Language Theatre - was born.

Over the years, BELT has done many performances. What has been the most significant aspect of this work?

- I’m convinced that when you create a story with children, using theatre as a learning experience and producing a play, their personal development becomes more empowered. That is the most significant part. It is especially meaningful for them when they see their own words and ideas being repeated and performed on stage - for example, if they say something on Tuesday, I write it down on Wednesday, and by Thursday it’s being performed on stage. This shows them that what they said matters, and they hear it on stage - all of this happens when they are nine or ten years old.

Of course, you don’t always have the energy for it, but once you start and complete a play, those texts and performances can be used for future groups in the next season. Children understand better the ideas created by other children and more easily grasp the story. When children participate in creating a play themselves, it empowers them and builds their confidence.

You’ve also used Shakespeare with children and developed a special approach to such serious texts, calling it “Silly Shakespeare for Students.” How did that come about?

- When I started with one of my first groups of children, I used Commedia dell’arte, which is based on improvisation. The text script wasn’t fully written - only the outline of the scene, what should happen, and which characters do what. The rest is based on improvisation. The dialogues are mostly improvised.

Later, a group asked me to do something by Shakespeare. I initially said no. I hadn’t liked Shakespeare since school - it’s difficult, technically demanding, and the last thing I wanted to do. Later, I thought of using the same method as with Commedia dell’arte. I found a summarized version of Hamlet online, essentially a retold version for students who don’t like reading much. That’s where we started.

For example, in one scene, three guards see the ghost and scream… and so on. We tried to improvise the dialogue. When they improvised, one boy said something that rhymed, and everyone laughed. Then the whole class turned it into making rhymes, and they asked if I could write that down for the next class. I wrote the first scene this way, and in three weeks, we had written the entire play collaboratively.

Serbian Humor Is Similar to English Humor: Dr. Paul Murray PHOTO: Marko Divjak

After working with children, you started working in film?

- That happened spontaneously, almost by chance. My stepdaughter’s best friend was the daughter of the late Dinko Tucaković. They were friends, and that’s how I met him. He was a kind and good man, ran Kinoteka, and at that time he had long been planning to shoot his second film Dr. Ray and the Devils. It was about an American director who came to live in Belgrade. At first, he asked me to help with the English language. Later, the actors he wanted to hire had declined - the budget wasn’t large. They had tried to hire some big names, but since they couldn’t afford them, they offered me the role of Dr. Ray. That became my first film. I had to learn a lot because film is quite different from theatre.

Now, in Serbia, more and more TV series and films are made in English or partially in English, and I learned how to work in that environment and take on those roles. I now regularly act for TV series and films. Specifically, I have a role in the series Robin Hood, produced by MGM. This is the largest foreign production done entirely in Serbia, from start to finish, including editing. Then there’s the sci-fi series The Ark. That’s a smaller production; we finished the third season, and I hope we will do another season. On these projects, I often meet people who were part of the team for the film Dr. Ray and the Devils.

Do you prefer film or theatre?

- I like the combination of both theatre and film work. I hope I won’t have to choose between the two.

What is the most important lesson you’ve learned in your career so far?

- Everything is a play.

Have you considered making a play with people from Laza Lazarević hospital?

- Initially, when I first moved to Belgrade, I worked with several NGOs, social workers, psychiatrists, teachers, and doctors on applying drama and theatre principles in the treatment process. I conducted workshops and training sessions, sharing with them theatre techniques which could be used with the people they were treating. Due to the language barrier, I did not work directly with the patients or groups.

Were there any results?

- I don’t know. I hope positive ones!

Do you have a story that you’ve never told anyone before?

- Yes, there is one more story, in the context of how theatre can influence and change people. It happened in a school for autistic children. There was a little boy, nine years old, who would just sit in the room and stare out the window - he did nothing else. I was told he was a loner, a refuser, who did not and could not participate with others. When we started working, he always just sat and watched out the window, and at the end, he would leave when the other children left. I kept trying to think of ways to help him engage in the play. He acted as if he only wanted to watch and didn’t want to do anything active. I believe everyone should have a social role in society, so I tried and tried, but nothing - Mark didn’t change his position or attitude. I used all my skills and knowledge, but I couldn’t reach him. He was the only person I couldn’t connect with at that time.

We were working on a performance of Romeo and Juliet, which we called Romeo and John, because we didn’t have a Juliet in the group. Each child played several roles. One boy, Christian, was playing a prince and said, “I need an assistant.” I looked around - there was no one. Christian asked if Mark could be his assistant. I thought there was no chance, but I told him to ask Mark. Christian approached him and said, “Mark, do you want to be my assistant.” Mark asked what he had to do. Christian said, “You just need to sit where you are and look out the window.” This confused and unsettled him, but eventually he said okay.

For the next five weeks, Mark played the assistant who sits and looks out the window. When the prince spoke, he addressed him; Mark would nod, and that was it. One day, Mark brought a plastic bottle and asked if he could be the prince’s assistant who looks out the window and has a plastic bottle. I asked if the others agreed - they all did - and he continued.

I realized that it was theatre that activated him - not me, nor the other boy. We included him, and now he was contributing to something. He knew he was contributing, even though he was doing what he always did. He had been noticed. Gradually, he gained confidence. After a few weeks, he began standing next to the prince as his “guardian,” and slowly started participating more in the play.

This story shows how theatre can give people a way to engage and contribute in a way that suits them, encouraging growth and confidence.