For director Damkerng Thitapiyasak, bringing Franz Kafka's The Trial to life on stage is one of his "long-time desires to be realised".
The Trial after Kafka’s.
He read the novel while directing Kafka's The Metamorphosis in 1995 with Goethe Institute Bangkok and
Saeng-Arun Arts Centre, and he was very much inspired by the subjects of justice and law, as well as their power to control and threaten men in their daily life.
To be staged at Democrazy Theatre Studio, the play is titled The Trial After Kafka's. Damkerng explains that it's an extension beyond Kafka's original story.
"Karun is chief attorney in a large company, working in the insurance department until he is promoted to headquarters," says Damkerng about his plot. "He is a serious, responsible worker, trying to help the people that come to him, but he is often thwarted by his company, whose goals remain largely nebulous to Karun. However, he is an individual at odds with the world around him, and unable to grasp it all.
"It seems to be another story, but the main characters and mysterious atmosphere remain. This trial is 'after' Kafka's, it updates all the 'Kafkaesque-ness' from the original to be the world of an indictment of capitalism, of the all-powerful financial-industrial complex." This is the first play of 2014 from Damkerng after last year's Silhouette Of God, a play based on Wimon Sainimnuan's novel Khon Song Chao and an adaptation of Herman Hesse's Siddhartha.
Although much of the play is drawn from Kafka's anxiety-fuelled world, Damkerng says it's been influenced by a lot of adaptions he has found and collected during the time he was studying in Europe.
"At first, same as Metamorphosis, I was interested to do this play as a physical theatre by using the adaptations of Steven Berkoff, Andre Gide, Jean-Louis Barrault and Harold Pinter's screenplay, which are quite faithful to the original plot and theme of Kafka's.
"However, after I had read Peter Weiss' The New Trial, a new idea came up in my mind because this version is clearer, more contemporary and relevant to the problematic issues in Thai society."
Although Damkerng says that his play can be labelled as an adaptation, he says his method is more like a transcreation rather than just a general literary adaptation.
"I always use more than one existed sources or adaptations to compose the play. Although the text is very much relied on Weiss's new plot, but I use many memorable imageries and moments from the original of Kafka's."
The Trial After Kafka's, 8pm at Democrazy Theatre Studio, Jan 30-Feb 18 except Wed. Tickets cost 650 baht. Call 081-441-5718.
The Trial after Kafka’s.
