I answered for the words: Sergey Zhenovach made "Ivanov" a silent man
In Anton Chekhov's plays, almost all the action takes place in words. However, the artistic director of the Theater Art Studio, Sergei Zhenovach, took a different path and almost deprived the main character of speech in his new production Chekhov. Ivanov. Words. Words. Words." The director's favorite team worked on the play: artist Alexander Borovsky, lighting designer Damir Ismagilov and composer Grigory Gobernik. Starring Alexey Vertkov. Izvestia visited the premiere screening and tells us how this experiment turned out.
The time symptom
Sergei Zhenovach, the ideological leader of the Theater Art Studio, has a long-standing, almost family relationship with Chekhov. This is the fifth appeal of the director to the playwright. After the recent production of Chekhov. Cherry orchard. There are no words", played almost entirely in silence, the new play looks not like a continuation, but a refinement of the found method, despite the antagonistic name "Chekhov. Ivanov. Words. Words. Words." The difference is fundamental: in the Garden, silence was a collective loss, here it was a personal fault.
The play "Ivanov" is one of Chekhov's most painful texts. Five author's editorials, endless arguments, accusations of immorality of the hero and attempts to explain his condition by "Russian melancholy." Chekhov himself wrote about Ivanov as a man who does not solve problems, but falls under their weight. At the end of the 19th century, it was a portrait of a "broken man." In the 21st century, it is almost the norm.
For the Theater Art Studio, Chekhov is not just a repertoire author, but a way of thinking. "Three Sisters", "Notebooks", "Three Years" have already been shown here, and its own cherry orchard grows in the courtyard of the theater.
Silence is a sign of disagreement
From the first seconds it is clear that there will be no textbook Chekhov. A single candle is burning in front of the black curtain. This is not a household prologue, but almost a funeral rite. The performance opens with two giant black rats suddenly bursting through the auditorium onto the stage. Rodents are a reference to another performance by Zhenovach, "Labardan-s" based on Gogol's "The Inspector General". Closer to the final Lebedev (Andrey Shibarshin) in conversation with his daughter Shurochka (Alyona Semenova / Anna Sarkisova) He will also remember them: "Gogol's two rats first sniffed, then left. And you, without sniffing, attacked me."
Zhenovach's favorite team took over the production again: artist Alexander Borovsky, lighting designer Damir Ismagilov and composer Grigory Gobernik. Together, they continue to search for new things in the texts of the classic, whose plays, it would seem, have been studied by the entire world theater under a microscope.
Alexander Borovsky draws the viewer into the landowner's living room. In the center of the stage is a made—up couch. Two scarlet doors are located symmetrically behind it. Between them is a snow—white stove. STIs like to talk to the viewer through space, so the sofa very quickly ceases to be furniture and becomes something between a hospital bed and a coffin. Ivanov (Alexey Vertkov) is lying on it. He lies for a long time, almost motionless, occasionally turning over from one side to the other. And he's been silent for an hour and a half.
Once he shouted, was indignant, argued, read poetry, told jokes. Now he doesn't get up from the sofa. And life is rushing by behind his back. Words, words, words come out of the slamming doors. They are tenderly poured out, ingratiatingly pronounced, and menacingly shouted by Borkin (Nikita Isachenkov), Ivanov's wife Anna Petrovna (Tatiana Volkova), dying of consumption, Count Shebelsky (Yuri Gorin), suffering from boredom, and the zemstvo doctor Lvov (Alexander Suvorov), who blames the imminent death of the hostess of the house. But Vertkov doesn't say a word to that.
This silence is neither philosophical nor beautiful. Sometimes it's annoying. I want Ivanov to finally stand up, shout, and justify himself. But he stubbornly continues to lie there.
The viewer, of course, can quip: the role is good — lie on the couch and wait for the end of the performance. But such judgments are instantly shattered by Vertkov's intense work on the image. The only means of expression left to him by the director is to play with his eyes. They need to convey pain, apathy, disappointment in life and oneself, sadness, neglect, anger, and much more of what people are used to shaking the air with. And he does it masterfully: he lies on the stage in the deepest depression.
The irony is that during the time of silence, Vertkov reports more about the hero than many Ivanovs, who spoke Chekhov's text from cover to cover. This silence is not a pose or a technique, but a form of fatigue brought to physiology. The hero is literally unable to speak, because any word will be a lie.
Clowning on the edge of despair
Paradoxically, for all the bleakness of the concept, the performance is often ridiculous. And that laugh is precise, nervous, and life—saving. 89-year-old actor Yuri Gorin, who plays Ivanov's uncle, Count Matvey Shabelsky, rightly calls this the ultimate clowning — the ability to find the funny in the tragic. Chekhov's laughter here does not make it easier, but, on the contrary, increases hopelessness.
Damir Ismagilov's light works like a surgical instrument: it snatches out, cuts off, and leaves in the penumbra what is usually explained in words. At the same time, Gregory Gobernicus' music does not lead to emotion, but rather captures the pulse of the performance — rare, confused, and disturbing.
Literally ten minutes before the final applause, Ivanov nevertheless stands up and delivers a long monologue, responding to each claim. It would seem that this is where the climax should happen. But at this moment, the light bulb can not withstand the tension that the actors so diligently pumped up, and explodes. And, despite the well-known tragic outcome of the play, the finale turns out to be blurred. It is clear that leaving Alexey Vertkov without any text at all would be an extremely risky and probably insulting decision for the artist.
However, these are all words, words, words.
Переведено сервисом «Яндекс Переводчик»
