The dilema that could be brought down to the qustion what is, from genre point of view this Shakespeare`s play, is solved by director Egon Savin with radical actualization of its subject.

He with the help of the picturesque costumes, as well as with the allusions that spring out smoothly from Shakespeare`s text, situates the plot in early thirties of the previous century, in Italy overshadowed by the facism that is approaching, in Italy poisoned with racism, xenofobia, violence and law banding...

For Egon Savin, Shylock is neather comical nor grotesque or vicious character. He is, simply humiliated, and embittered man ready to make a Faustain contract with the devil in person, in order to return his self-respect and his lost dignity so that he could value him self more justly.