We're actually singing a song: antique frogs and office plankton on Moscow stages
The Moscow theater kaleidoscope turned out to be very colorful in April. The ancient Greek cabaret in Kuzminki, the documentary drama about teenagers on Strastnoy, the good old tale in the Southwest, Shakespeare on Novoslobodskaya and the modern psychological thriller about office plankton on Mayakovka — and this is just what Vlad Vasyukhin managed to get acquainted with for his monthly review of criticism, especially for Izvestia.
"Frogs"
Moscow Provincial Theatre
Aristophanes' comedies almost never appear on the Russian stage, and this is already a reason not to miss the premiere. The second reason is that the director of the ancient Greek text (405 BC) was a real Greek. In the portfolio of the young director Vasilios Samourkas there are three quite successful embodiments of ancient tragedies — in theaters in Moscow, Ryazan and Smolensk. The plot of "Frogs", as well as the play based on it, also concerns tragedians: the god of wine and theater, Dionysus (Oleg Kurlov), goes to the afterlife to bring back one of the great playwrights from there — there are no more of them on earth. The choice has to be made between Euripides (Evgeny Gomona) and Aeschylus (Igor Nazarenko).
"What does that have to do with frogs?" you might ask. The Choir of frogs, like the Choir of Dead Widows, will comment on what is happening. The actors perform several roles. And the director himself will appear even in character... Maria Callas! Yes, the classic text has been adapted, it is modern and full of quotes, including the direct speech of the artists themselves.
Frogs will be appreciated by those who love absurdity, avant-garde, poetry, sharp form, live music and recklessness. Sergei Bezrukov, artistic director of the Gubernia Art Institute, who gave his voice to the performance (he plays Homer in the recording), described this show as "an ancient Greek cabaret with elements of Russian psychological theater."
"Lear"
The Shalom Theater
Yana Tumina's almost four—hour performance turned out to be polyphonic, plastic and fascinatingly beautiful, when light, shadows, music and sounds in general are full participants in the spectacle. But viewers who expect to see Shakespeare's tragedy about the conflict between the old king and his three daughters should prepare for it to be a multi-layered "theater within a theater," an experimental spectacle "based on motives."
There are three Lyres here: Oleg Lipovetsky, the energetic and temperamental artistic director of Shalom, who does not look at all like a decrepit ruler and also plays the director who is directing King Lear and playing the main role... The legendary Solomon Mikhoels, who played this role 90 years ago in the legendary play of the State Jewish Theater. All this jumble of meanings, myths and times, as well as new characters like DJ William, distracts and leads away from Shakespearean passions. By the way, a small spoiler — there will be no tragic ending in this "Lyre". More precisely, it will not be as hopeless as the author's.
"An ordinary miracle"
Theater in the Southwest
The performance will be interesting even to those who know Evgeny Schwartz's play almost by heart, thanks to Mark Zakharov's film that never leaves the TV screen. Director Oleg Anishchenko (who also plays the Magician in his production) tried to distance himself as much as possible from the 1978 film version. Even to the hits of Gladkov and Kim, he preferred specially written music (and very successful, memorable) by Evgeny Kharlanov.
Diligently following the author's text, the production team, ranging from tenderness to the grotesque, tells the story of love and choice. After all, if the Princess (Maria Savitskaya) kisses the young man (Igor Mikhmel), he will turn into a bear again. The main idea of the play is that love is the absence of fear.
"Day of Closed Doors"
Theater of Nations, New Space
Dmitry Krestyankin can be accused of self—promotion and narcissism - during the performance, where the 37-year—old director and playwright plays himself, for some reason he reminds the audience several times that he is Dmitry Krestyankin. But this small weakness of the showman can be forgiven, since the genre of social theater in which Dmitry works and the topics that he persistently touches on, to put it mildly, are not the most popular among his colleagues, they do not bring a lot of money and fame.
Krestyankin made a play after being behind the closed doors of the colonies for one day, based on his conversations with boys and girls in correctional institutions in Tomsk and Arkhangelsk. Juvenile offenders are played by young artists, yesterday's students. The topics of these candid interviews are broken destinies, life in freedom and in captivity, love, hopes and plans.
"The Grenholm Method"
Theater of Satire
The office drama by Catalan Jordi Galceran y Ferrera, written in 2003 and has since become an international hit, is one of the self-playing films. The author has so famously twisted the plot about the devaluation of personality that no additional interpretations are required — play according to what you have written. And it seems that the creators of the play need to try hard to make the audience get bored on this roller coaster. But the lightness is, of course, visible.
The play preserves the unity of place, time, and action.: Four candidates for the position of commercial director of a large corporation are interviewed using the method of a group psychological game. Cruel and funny at the same time, where there is a place for bullying, lies, exhibitionism and manipulation. The young director Albert Khasiev and his team used minimalistic means to create a tense spectacle in the Attic of Satire. The main star and motor of the play is Viktor Loginov in the role of Fernando. The audience, who knows him only as Gena Bukin from the TV series "Happy Together", will be pleasantly surprised.
Переведено сервисом «Яндекс Переводчик»
