How will we celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Alexander Ostrovsky?

2023 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Alexander Ostrovsky. The center of the anniversary events will be Moscow, where he was born on March 31 (April 12 according to the new style), 1823 in a two-story wooden house on Malaya Ordynka. Surprisingly, the house has been preserved and by the anniversary of the Russian playwright should open after a comprehensive restoration. But the main part of the anniversary events will take place in Ostrovsky’s other home, the Maly Theatre, where all of his 48 plays were staged at different times. And also in the estate where he lived for many years.

“This season is special for us,” said Alexei Dubrovsky, deputy artistic director of the Maly Theater, at a press conference at the Rossiya Segodnya news agency. – Ostrovsky’s anniversary is coming, and we are preparing for this event with trepidation. Now there are 13 of his plays on the playbill of the theater, over the past six months three more premieres have been released – Balzaminov’s Marriage, In a Busy Place, Hot Heart, and Thunderstorm is being prepared for the production. We are not going to stop there.”

There is a whole list of events on the occasion of the playwright’s anniversary in the theater. For example, in April all scenes will be given to the XIII International Festival “Ostrovsky in Ostrovsky’s House”. In addition, within the walls of the Maly Theater there will be a director’s laboratory “Comprehension of Ostrovsky” – a new interesting format of cooperation with young directors.

“And that’s not all,” Alexey Vladimirovich assures. – Since the theater has its own film studio, in the spring we will start filming the documentary “Real Places of Fictional Heroes”. To do this, we will go to the estate of Alexander Nikolayevich, the village of Shchelykovo, Kostroma Region, where the shooting will take place in real-life interiors – the Ostrovsky estate itself, its environs and in the city of Kineshma. For example, we will shoot in a clearing where the heart of the Snow Maiden melted; on the border of the Ivanovo and Kostroma regions, where the tavern “On a Busy Place” was located, at the so-called “turn” (the meeting place for the heroes of the play “The Forest” by Schastlivtsev and Neschastlivtsev), and other locations. Naturally, we are in constant contact with the director of the Shchelykovo Museum-Reserve, Anna Rodionova, who helps us to the best of her ability.”

The second center of the anniversary events will be the estate of Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky, now called the Shchelykovo Museum-Reserve.

Its director, Anna Vladimirovna Rodionova, has doubled her worries, since two anniversaries are also expected – the playwright itself and the 100th anniversary of the museum itself, which opened in 1923. Therefore, on the agenda, in addition to creative projects, is the solution of economic issues, the completion of restoration work.

“In order to invite guests into the house, it is necessary to restore exemplary order in it. But it is not yet possible to do this in full, – says Anna Vladimirovna. “Insufficient funding does not make it possible to solve all the problems.”

You can understand Anna Vladimirovna. Guests always want to meet in the best possible way. But so far there is not enough money even to patch up somewhere, and somewhere to replace balconies and stairs, to bring the park alley into proper shape, to repair the dam on the Kueksha River.

Shchelykovites are very much looking forward to the fact that in the anniversary year the administration of the Ivanovo region will repair the road leading from Kineshma to Shchelykovo. Tour bus drivers often refuse to go here. The road is full of patches and potholes – a washboard in its purest form. We speak as witnesses. The distance that could have been overcome in 20 minutes, we mastered with difficulty in more than an hour …

There are other problems in the museum, no less urgent – for example, a shortage of personnel. And that is to say, Shchelykovo is a remote place, salaries are small, there is nothing to interest people, so local residents mainly work here.

“Our team is wonderful, friendly, and, plus everything, enough events are planned for the anniversary year – performances, concerts, exhibitions and much more that may interest students to come to work with us in the summer, for example, as guides,” the director suggests. We will be happy to accept volunteers as well.

Anna Vladimirovna is “rooting” for her museum. And he sincerely believes that once having got here, a person will not be able to forget the place where the great playwright lived. And when he returns home, he will want to re-read his plays and rediscover them for himself.

Natalia Anokhina.