Imitation of Life

Director Kornél Mundruczó and his Proton Theatre company bring the story of an eviction to the stage. The Hungarian director's characteristic twists of magical realism up creating a highly detailed reflection of our society and the relationships between human beings we establish. It is a poetic and political show based on real events, and has been admired from and won awards all over Europe.

To fulfil the last wishes in a dead man's will, a man arrives in a flat in Budapest to evict the woman who lives there, but an unexpected turn of events prevents him from carrying out his plan. He will be forced to examine his conscience, while the dark secrets that the apartment conceals will emerge, and the new tenants will have to face them. In the banality of our lives and our absolute lack of empathy, and our lack of any ability to communicate if it is not through technology, do we choose our fates, or are our lives predestined? The characters live an imitation of life; a life that is far removed from the political situation of the present. A space on the edge of a society in which injustice is an unwritten law.

“The most effective theatrical enactment of this particular situation I have watched to date. I have never before watched a more effective commentary on the demolition of life and memory; the crushing of little objects that everybody is entitled to carry and keep, save for the homeless, the minorities, and all those persecuted on account of their race. Significantly enough, the young Hungarian director, with sensibility and ingenuity, captures the racism of everyday life, the various discriminations, the experience of living a life without any prospects." (artplay.gr - Greece)

Best stage design: Márton Ágh - Hungarian Theatre Critics Award 2016.
Best writing and dramaturgy: Kata Wéber and Soma Boronkay and Best stage design: Márton Ágh - 17th National Theatre Festival 2017. Pécs, Hungary
Audience Award - Baltic House Festival 2017. Saint Petersburg, Russia


In 2009, Kornél Mundruczó, film and theatre director, and Dóra Büki, theatre producer, founded Proton Theatre, a virtual artistic company organised around the director’s independent productions. Besides preserving maximum artistic freedom, their goal is to ensure a professional structure for their independently produced theatre plays and projects. Chiefly, their performances are realized as international co-productions, and their frequent collaborators include the Wiener Festwochen; HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin; KunstenFestivalDesArts, Brussels; Trafó House of Contemporary Arts, Budapest; HELLERAU, Dresden.

Besides productions directed by the artistic leader – namely, The Ice (2006); Frankenstein Project (2007); Hard to be a God (2010); Disgrace (2012); Dementia (2013); Winterreise (2015); Imitation of Life (2016); The Raft of the Medusa (2018); Evolution (2019) – they wish to provide space for the realisation of the company members’ ideas. In this spirit the following performances were created: Last, directed by Roland Rába (2014), 1 Link, directed by Gergely Bánki (2015) and Finding Quincy, directed by János Szemenyei (2017).

The performances of the Proton Theatre have been touring to more than 110 festivals during these years, from Festival d’Avignon through Adelaide Festival to Singapore International Festival, Seoul Bo:m Festival or the Zürcher Theaterspektakel.