The Star Without a Name by Mihail Sebastian

 The Star Without a Name by Mihail Sebastian

 

 

It is a bad habit to have the TV on, even if only somewhere in the background and set on Mezzo. Last night I happen to find the “Star without a Name” by Mihail Sebastian.  I am familiar with the author, from his Journal that I had read some years ago. I enjoyed The Journal and I was surprised to find myself captivated by the play.

The heroine was played by some strange actress, I had never heard of before and her acting was somehow off-putting. The hero, Marin was a little better, but not much.

Udrea played by Octavian Cotescu was very good. Less so the character played by Ovidiu Iuliu Moldovan.

 

In other words, in spite of generally modest performances, I enjoyed the production and that is almost exclusively the merit of the text of the play itself. It has some humor at the beginning and along the way, not easily sent across the screen by what I rate as a poor direction.

A train arrives at the railway station, in a small town. A beautiful and extravagant woman is taken off the train, because she was found with no ticket and she has no money or indeed anything except her fancy dress. Since she can pay neither ticket nor fine, she is left in the station, where she meets professor Marin. He is there in connection with an astonishingly expensive book he had bought for 21,000 lei. I am not sure how that would translate in today’s money, but all along the way, the fabulous sum of money paid for the book is shocking various characters.

Mona, the strange woman form the train, has no money and no place where to spend the night. after contemplating the few possible alternatives, Marin offers his home and, as a gentleman says that he will spend the night at Udrea, his friend.

The exotique woman, finds the Marin’s home charming, albeit deprived of modern amenities: the factory” stops the water supply after 6 and water has to be taken from a well and then an improvisation used to water flowers in the garden is used in order to take a shower after six.

Mona is impressed with the biggest number of books she had ever seen and with Marin, who turns out to be an impressive intellectual, with a passion for astronomy- ergo the name of the play.

This is a moment when we feel the paradox: in the first place, the beautiful well dressed woman from the city seemed to be way above the poor professor from the small town.

Now the scales have turned and we admire the knowledge and erudition of Marin, faced with an ignorant young thing.

They fall in love and make some utopic plans for the future, punctuated with humorous concern for what the neighbors will say- they seem to be all hiding behind the curtains, ready to put down this outlandish female, with her inappropriate dress…

Just in case you’re reading this and your interest makes you read or listen to the play, I will not say what unexpected events take place towards the end.

I liked the play, which kept me in front of the TV screen to the end, and I have a rather short attention span and tend to abandon quickly many films, plays and books. I do not even bother to see the first scenes of Spider or X- Men, no matter how smashing their box office is.

But a little known play, outside Romania is beyond many Hollywood productions on my list.

 

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