“I had been cut off from my roots, so I had to find new ones”

József Szarvas’s Fairy Garden

Abstract

József Szarvas made his way to acting from the farmlands of the Hungarian Great Plain. He began his career as a bit player in Debrecen and was almost 30 years old when he graduated from the Academy of Theatre and Film Arts. It was on the advice of his former academic mentor, István Horvai, that he signed a contract with the Vígszínház, of which he remained a member for a decade. Afterwards, he worked with the Kaposvár company and in 2002, he joined the National Theatre in Budapest. In the meantime, he had major roles in a host of feature and art films. We talked to the Jászai Mari Prize winner Merited Artist and Distinguished Artist of Hungary, who has also won numerous other professional awards, about rootlessness, about his long sought and eventually found identity. For him, the clear spring to draw from is the Fairy Garden, created from the native fruit trees of the Carpathian Basin, and the Barn Theatre of Őrség, founded by him and his family.