Victor Erofeev about the impact on the best theaters in Moscow: The Fracture of Culture | Culture and lifestyle in Germany and Europe | DW

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The blow to the best theaters in Moscow is a natural continuation of the “military special operation”, which, in search of enemies, found them in the deep cultural rear. Not only the ideological positions of theater directors, but also their dreams of future productions, under the mask of non-renewal of contracts, well known to me, were subjected to a rocket attack of hatred, fear and cowardice. There are real victims. This is, first of all, the Gogol Center created by Kirill Serebrennikov, to which the Moscow Department of Culture returned the dreary name of the Gogol Theater, reminiscent of its senile past.

What will happen to the performances and actors of the Gogol Center who dared to have their own, different from the official, opinion about the war in Ukraine? What will be banned, who will be expelled from the theater? In terms of the scale of the clash with culture, our authorities are already comparable to the Bolshevik coup. It is possible that they even outdo the memorable persecution of class enemies. Then they came up with the category of pro-Soviet fellow travelers – now you need not only loyalty, but also dog loyalty. An absolutely monstrous victim of the shelling turned out to be Iosif Raihelgauz, the long-term director of the theater “School of the Modern Play” on Trubnaya. The entire Moscow theatrical world knows Joseph as an inventive master of directing, who devoted his whole life to creativity. You really have to be an aggressive ignoramus to raise a hand against a master. And finally, the legendary Sovremennik: to interfere in the creative affairs of such a theater is an unforgivable sin.

The Moscow authorities have announced a change of leadership at the Gogol Center. Serebrennikov called it the “murder” of the theater

Who and why undertook these devastating decisions, tantamount to an insult and humiliation of culture, which repeat the dark days of tsarism and communism?

Various assumptions are possible.

Most likely, this is a rehearsal of a big performance called “Successor”. The repressions against the entire liberal camp, including the aforementioned theaters, are a frank desire of the security forces to prevent another historical thaw, which would hardly have spared them. In culture, this party of war finds disturbers of public peace and is somehow not very stable, fragile, capable of turning into a storm at some point. The successor to X, who will eventually appear for purely biological reasons, should, according to the Chekists, continue the policy of the besieged fortress, and the theater, if it is a real theater, is an open platform, in its essence striving for dialogue. Culture in our country traditionally opposes the lawlessness and impunity of the upper classes. It can be broken or bought, but then it will cease to be a culture.

Viktor Erofeev

Viktor Erofeev

The theaters also came under fire for a purely formal reason for not complying with wartime laws. There has been no official war for more than a hundred days now, and wartime laws are becoming more and more stringent. Censorship is still made up for all sorts of formal reasons to close an exhibition or theater, but soon it will be possible to perform without make-up. The desire to curry favor with the president, who offers to compose songs about his valiant liberators, is growing by leaps and bounds. The history of the country is turned into a carousel.

But in addition to defeat, there is also a method of recruitment – there are many professionals in this business at the top. Putting a famous person in front of an unbearable choice: to leave his post, give up his favorite thing, or go for cooperation – this is a kind of torment. Essentially, sadistic torture. As you can see, the heads of the listed theaters did not agree to a deal – and received in full, although the topic of a soft rollback may arise or is already arising. For example, Dmitry Astrakhan, a fairly well-known director, obviously not an admirer of the military party, was appointed to replace Reichelgauz, but we’ll see what will happen to him and whether an ethical failure (if any) of professional ethics was appropriate. In Soviet times, an equally talented director, Anatoly Efros, was appointed to replace Yuri Lyubimov in the Taganka Theater. He kept the theater, but the sediment from his acceptance of the proposal to replace Lyubimov still remained.

But there are also cool examples of real or imagined surrender. The recent case of Mr. Hermitage, aka Piotrovsky, has the value of a mixture of villainy with a camouflaged defiance. It is clear that losing your museum brainchild is not a joke. It is clear that every person is not perfect and is sometimes prone to compromises, which our homeland taught us for a long time. That is why when the head of the country’s great museum talks in an interview with a government newspaper about the imperial nature of the Russian mentality and about the war as a national self-affirmation, it becomes unclear whether he is secretly mocking the authorities, playing along with them, or simply, under the guise of surrender, talks about things that are closer to Chaadaev than the president. In any case, he said – the liberals were indignant – they all forgot after a while, but the post was kept, and the collection, which tells about the age-old humanity of art, was kept under the wing of Mr. Hermitage.

No matter how further events develop on the cultural front, it is clear that we are dealing with a fracture of culture, with its deconstruction. Some are for, others are against, others have not decided – all this is a familiar picture of Russian reality. But when it comes to the laws of wartime, the diversity of opinions turns in the heads of those in power into a call for its elimination. If you want to be silent, be silent, but do not demand public money and support from the Department of Culture. Strongly dissatisfied we will write down in foreign agents, and such fine fellows as Mr. Hermitage we will block and we will appease. It cannot be otherwise in our kingdom-state. It’s a pity, however, beautiful theatres.

Viktor Erofeev, writer, literary critic, TV presenter, author of the books “Russian Beauty”, “Good Stalin”, “Akimuds” and many others, holder of the French Order of the Legion of Honor.

This comment expresses the personal opinion of the author. It may not coincide with the opinion of the Russian editors and Deutsche Welle in general.

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