2023-06-09 00:10:33
In 2023, the 30th anniversary of the International Theater Festival named after. A.P. Chekhov. It takes place in Moscow every two years. This time – from the end of May to October 8. In the current geopolitical conditions, one would expect the festival to be cancelled, but it survived.
Theaters from Argentina, Chile, South Africa, China, Cuba, India, Vietnam, Brazil, etc. will bring their performances to Russia. In total, there are 15 performances and 14 participating countries in the world series of the festival, which is comparable to previous years. So, in 2021, despite the pandemic, we managed to bring 13 performances from foreign theaters. In 2019 there were 22 of them, in 2017 – 16. In total, during the existence of the festival, more than 600 performances took part in it – these are the works of 437 directors from 54 countries.
This year the Chekhov Festival is dedicated to the memory of Valery Shadrin, the creator and CEO of the Chekhov Festival (1992–2022). The festival created by him chose the words of the Italian director Giorgio Strehler as his motto: “Theater for the people”. And its main task is to acquaint and familiarize Russian viewers with the best productions of foreign and domestic theaters. It can be done even in difficult times.
For the first time, theaters from Western Europe and North America are practically not represented in the main program of the Chekhov Festival. The geopolitical situation is affecting. Russia is open to the world and ready to maintain international cultural ties, but so far there are restrictions on the part of foreign institutions, Mikhail Shvydkoi, president of the Chekhov Festival, said in an interview with Vedomosti in May.
It must be said that the festival has never been purely European. Among the participants of different years – Argentina, Brazil, India, China, South Korea, etc. But still, the most important part of the so-called world series fell on Western countries. Peter Brook, Peter Stein, Declan Donnelan, Robert Lepage, Pina Bausch and others brought their performances. Back in 2021, despite the pandemic, they managed to show productions from theaters in Spain, France, Italy, and Finland at the festival. In 2019, theater companies from Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Great Britain, etc. were among the guests.
This year, only Spain will present one of its productions as part of the festival’s “Street Program”.
Choreographic art traditionally occupies a special place in the festival program. This year, six dance performances are presented by theater companies from Argentina, Chile, South Africa, China and Cuba. Despite such geographical expansion, there is something that unites them. Each performance is created in one way or another based on the national memory, on the history of its people.
The festival opened in May with a dance show “Wild Tango” by Herman Cornejo Company (Argentina). This is a performance about the history and evolution of dance. In his own way, the connection of times is explored by the Chilean director Ricardo Curakeo. In June, his dance company will present a performance called Malene about the Mapuche (Araucan) Indian people living in Chile and Argentina. In the Araucanian language, “malen” means young girls who begin to learn sacred knowledge from older women. This is a plastic and poetic, almost ritual action, in which 16 performers aged from 10 to 70 take part. The archaic force, awakening, seems to stretch out from the past into the present.
The famous “Bolero” by Maurice Ravel, the novel “Zion” by the living writer Zakes Mda. It would seem, what does history, memory, folk culture have to do with it? But it is precisely these works that the choreographer Gregory Vuyani Makoma, the leader of modern dance in South Africa, relies on in the production of Zion: Requiem for Ravel’s Bolero. In this music, he heard the ritual mourning motifs of his homeland. The novel was written by a South African author, the protagonist of the work is an original character, a professional mourner of Toloka. Both primary sources are reworked here so that the performance is universal in thought and deeply national in form. This is a story about universal sorrow, in which you can die, but you can also be saved by uniting with those who, like you, are crying. The performance will be available in September.
In the play “Tea Spell” (also to be presented in September) by Zhao Liang Art (China), history is present not only in the form of dance itself, in the theme or plot twists, but even in objects. According to the festival’s website, for the first time in the history of Chinese theater, instead of props, a replica of an antique tea set, which was used during his lifetime by Emperor Xizong of the Tang Dynasty in the 9th century, is on stage. The artifact becomes the starting point of the story, in which the director continues to study the relationship between heaven and earth, man and eternity.
Drama never happens
The World Drama Theater is represented by three performances. Two of them are based on classical dramaturgy. Both are trying to approach her outside the box, to find new keys to old doors.
An attempt to draw today’s, other meanings on top of the former ones was reflected even in the title of one of the productions. “To Moscow! Palimpsest” is the name of the play by the Brazilian company “Setor de Areas Isoladas” based on Chekhov’s play “Three Sisters”. It will be played in early October.
A palimpsest is the application of text or an image to an already used parchment. The original writing on it is scraped off, but the traces still show through. Here, on the “parchment” of Russian culture, Russian drama, the pattern of the Brazilian theater is applied. As a result, according to the authors’ idea, a musically rich stage reflection on a person in general should be obtained. The multi-figure play was reduced to six faces – four actresses and two musicians. For an hour and a half, they will talk about whether it is still possible to dream in the current world, whether there is a future and whether it is worth our hopes.
Also, an unconventional staging of the classic – Shakespeare’s tragedy – is “Macbeth: what’s done is done” by Cinematograph (India). The performance was created, let’s say, freely. Based on Macbeth. Shows will take place in mid-June.
“We cannot demonstrate how it was 400 years ago in some distant country. So, in order to create my own version, I asked my actors to tell their own darkest stories,” says director Rajat Kapoor (quote from the official website of the Chekhov Festival).
By the way, this is the third time Kapoor has turned to Shakespeare, and this is his fourth production where clowns are involved. Scary clowns. This decision splits the genre: tragedy and comedy, creepy and funny mixed up. But no matter what new forms the director is looking for, the topic is not new. The performance speaks of the eternal, inescapable human vices.
The third production stands apart. So outlandish that it is hardly possible to attribute it with certainty to the drama theater. It doesn’t even have a name – just Traditional Water Puppet Show (Vietnam). Here, the key line of this festival manifests itself especially clearly – reliance on national culture, root traditions. In particular, the Vietnamese theater on the water arose more than a thousand years ago and exists to this day in the same original form.
And Thang Long, who became a participant in the program, is the most famous among the current water puppet theaters. The 40-minute action consists of genre scenes about peasant life, where there is a place not only for everyday life, but also for fairy tales. Under the live sounds of folk instruments, stories from Vietnamese myths and legends will be played. Performances are played in June.
Soul metamorphoses
The festival program includes six performances created by theaters of the CIS countries. Independent and joint productions are presented by Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Russia. It is based on classical dramaturgy, prose, and works by contemporary authors. Both musical and drama theatre. The variety is great. This direction of the program is mainly held together by what can be called the “angle of view”. On different material and in different forms, but one way or another, the authors focus on the inner spiritual metamorphoses of a person, on his searches and throwing, on how he experiences the trials of the spirit.
Two performances deserve special attention. This is the play “Mother’s Field” by the Syrdarya Regional Theater of Musical Drama from Uzbekistan based on the famous story by Chingiz Aitmatov (played in October). The focus here is not so much on the plot conflict as on the inner world of man. How, with what forces does it respond to fate and, in general, to the external laws of life? What is the main thing in a person, what defines him as a person? How does the soul process grief, how does it grow stronger with courage, how does it overflow with joy? This is what Nigora Goibazarova’s performance promises to tell.
“Hello, God! ..” – this is how the letter of the boy Arthur begins, who has only 12 days left to live (the production will be shown in October). It is he who is the main character of the play “Letters-Airplanes” of the Kyrgyz Theater for Young Spectators named after. B. Kydykeeva. Based on the works of Eric Emmanuel Schmitt “Oscar and the Pink Lady” and “Monsieur Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran”. The roles of children are given to puppets, adults are played by the actors themselves. Parallel to physical dying, mental life, on the other hand, is filled more than ever with content and with life itself as such. The performance speaks of what is higher and longer than death. He speaks about God and love, about friendship and hope, about spiritual stamina and strength of spirit.
street program
This time the Chekhov Festival has again returned to the program of street theaters. The last time it was in the pre-pandemic year of 2018, and for the first time the festival turned to the square theater in 2001. Spectators will be able to see the events of this program for free. They pass on the streets of Moscow in the summer months. Venues include Revolution Square, Luzhniki, Gorky Park, and others. Most of the program (seven performances in total; last time there were nine) are musical and dance performances with ethnic flavor. In June it will be the show “Mollfun”, ethnic, ritual and musical traditions of the Mapuche Araucan tribe from Chile. The choreography, in which ritual movements are mixed with elements of modern dance styles, will be performed by the representatives of the tribe.
In August, traditional Japanese drum music performed by the Nobushi group (Japan) will sound on the streets of the capital – the name of the group means “wild warrior” in translation.
Spain, despite all international difficulties, will also present its performance “Luxuria” as part of the “Street Program” in August. The Flamenco Ballet from Barcelona will perform the famous traditional Spanish dance, full of sensuality, passion, and tragic anguish, to live musical accompaniment.
Only one performance out of seven is not connected with the national culture either aesthetically or semantically. The plastic theater “InJest” from Belarus will show the play “The Golden Age” in Luzhniki in August. It will be a baroque pantomime with a fairy tale plot.
From Moscow to Moscow
Traditionally, the Chekhov Festival includes the Moscow Programme. These are the performances of the capital’s theaters, which can be seen both before and after the festival. Getting into the program, they seem to receive a quality mark (which, no doubt, is subjective, but nonetheless).
The program includes 43 performances from 25 theaters. As part of the festival, screenings run from May to October. Among them are productions that have long been loved by the audience, but most of them are premieres of the current season. Actually, this is the main thing that unites them. As for the rest – aesthetically, thematically, etc. – there is practically no common ground.
The Moscow program can serve as a guide for viewers who want to see the performances of the capital’s theaters worthy of attention in a short time. In particular, this performance of “Buffoon Pamfalon” by the Center for Drama and Directing is one of the brightest and most discussed theatrical events of the season. The almost seven-hour action is staged according to the “ancient legend” of the same name by Nikolai Leskov, which is based on the life of an early Christian righteous man. The production involves 60 performers, actors and musicians.
Another obligatory item of the “Moscow Program” is one of the best recent premieres of the Theater. Vakhtangov “The General and his family”. Worth attention and “I am Sergei Obraztsov” in the Puppet Theater. Obraztsova with Yevgeny Tsyganov in the title role – a biographical performance, awarded the “Golden Mask”. And also the sensational “Labardan-s” based on “The Government Inspector” at the Theater Arts Studio, where there is water on the stage.
The program of the Moscow series, as well as the entire festival, is fundamentally diverse and polyphonic. But the main thing in this multicolor is a conversation about where to look for support for a person who today has so few supports. About what to draw strength from and where to look for the truth, even if it seems that there is no truth either “on earth” or “above”.
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