Black-red-yellow obelisk – Newspaper Kommersant No. 28 (7473) of 02/15/2023

The artistic director of the “Pyotr Fomenko Workshop” Yevgeny Kamenkovich released on its stage the premiere of the play “Twenty-Third” based on Remarque’s novel “The Black Obelisk”, whose action takes place exactly one hundred years ago. Parallels with the events of a century ago studied Marina Shimadina.

Eight years ago, in 2014, Alexander Molochnikov, who made his directorial debut, staged a dashing cabaret performance “19.14”, dedicated to the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War, at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater. It cannot be said that he launched a broad theatrical reflection on the tragic epoch-making events of a century ago (this, by the way, is an interesting topic for a separate study). But historical rhymes and allusions constantly arose in one way or another – whether in Bulgakov’s “Running”, which suddenly appeared in many theaters, in Brecht’s productions (there are, however, embarrassingly few of them), or even in the recent premiere of the musical “Cabaret” at the Theater of Nations, where the action takes place in the early 1930s against the backdrop of advancing fascism, or in Boris Milgram’s Three Comrades in Perm based on Remarque’s most famous work.

Yevgeny Kamenkovich in the “Workshop of Pyotr Fomenko” called his new production “Twenty-Third”. Entering the hall, the audience sees a large inscription “1923” on the stage, marking the time of the action. The events of Remarque’s novel The Black Obelisk really take place exactly one hundred years ago – between two wars, when Germany had not yet recovered from the First World War, but was already mentally preparing for the Second. The economy is in crisis, inflation reaches monstrous proportions – the numbers on the screen are jumping, not keeping up with the frantic growth of the dollar, barter is being used. At the same time, life is in full swing in taverns and brothels: people spend their last pennies in order to at least briefly forget about the horrors of the surrounding reality. Meanwhile, National Socialism begins to mature in society.

The performance very clearly shows how the psychology of resentment works in society. Humiliated by their plight, many Germans forget what brought them to this point, but more and more often they remember great Germany and dream that she would “get up off her knees” again. It all starts, as usual, with patriotic songs about love for the motherland, and ends with pogroms. And those who until recently, sitting in the trenches, cursed the generals who unleashed this senseless massacre, are now “ready to repeat.”

Pyotr Fomenko’s Workshop and Yevgeny Kamenkovich generally specialize in big, difficult, non-staged prose, whether it’s Joyce’s Ulysses or Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago. It is interesting that the actors Yuri Butorin and Vladimir Toptsov became the authors of the staging of The Black Obelisk, also not the most popular novel by Remarque. They also play the main roles of former front-line comrades Ludwig and Krol, who now literally “deal in death” in the funeral home. But at the same time they desperately want to live. The subtitle of the performance is “the story of one belated youth”. But since in this novel by Remarque lengthy reflections prevail over the series of events proper, then in the production the characters do not so much love, suffer and act as they talk about God, about fate, about the past and the future.

Each of the characters here rather expresses a certain concept or position in life and is painted with the same color. Funeral home co-owner Heinrich (Dmitry Zakharov) and butcher Vatsek (Tagir Rakhimov) are carriers of the emerging Nazi ideology, Doctor (Oleg Lyubimov) and Pastor (Stepan Pyankov) are escapists escaping in philosophy and religion. Assertive and cheerful Gerda (Polina Airapetova), the protagonist’s mistress, is guided by the principle of Sally Bowles from Cabaret and shamelessly takes everything that they can give from life and from men. The secondary characters turned out to be the most striking here: the sexually horny undertaker Alfred (Alexander Morovov) and the butcher’s coquettish wife Liza – Ksenia Kutepova, who even manages to make her benefit performance from the episodes, unsteadily hobbled on her heels and making charming grimaces.

The laconic scenography by Alexander Borovsky emphasizes the conventionality and symbolism of the production. There are practically no household decorations and signs of time. And the scenes of action are indicated by three lifting panels of different colors: black is a funeral home and the general gloomy background of what is happening, red is the Red Mill cabaret, where they drink wine and dance Charleston with girls of easy virtue, and yellow is a psychiatric hospital, where Ludwig earns money by playing the organ and meets his platonic love. Genevieve / Isabella (Daria Konyzheva) suffers from a split personality due to a love drama, and this is also a kind of escapism. The work of the costume designer should be noted separately: Maria Borovskaya effectively complemented the set design with monochrome outfits, red on red, yellow on yellow.

In the finale, all three panels rise above the stage in the form of a tricolor: black, red, yellow. And the traditional symbolism of the colors of the German flag – “from the blackness of slavery through bloody battles to the golden light of freedom” – is filled with completely different, by no means sublime connotations.