In the theater. Gogol staged “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”

Anton Yakovlev presented Shakespeare’s comedy

Theatre. Gogol, who said goodbye to the name “Gogol-Center”, involuntarily continued his work. Not political or economic, of course, but artistic. The comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream based on Shakespeare appeared in his repertoire, which Kirill Serebrennikov once staged here. However, this is where all the coincidences end.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is played on the Small Stage, in a modest space, but on a grand scale. In any case, director Anton Yakovlev gave Shakespeare’s comedy the form of a show, using the virtually unbeatable “performance within a performance” technique.

First, the voice of the director sounds behind the scenes, giving the command to sound engineers, lighting engineers and actors, and then behind-the-scenes passions unfold in all their glory. Theseus, the Duke of Athens (Anatoly Prosalov), and the Queen of the Amazons Hippolyta (Maria Svirid) are preparing for a wedding celebration, which should be adorned with a magical performance in their honor. In addition, everything must happen on the night of the full moon, which will not do without magic, magic and surprises.

The story of two pairs of lovers immediately begins, in which there is clearly no agreement: Demetrius (Sergey Savichev) and Lysander (Evgeny Putsylo) are in love with Hermia (Alesya Alisievich), who loves the latter, for which her father will be given a choice: “Or die for violating paternal power, or marry the one he chose, / Or give forever at the altar of Diana / A vow of celibacy and a harsh life. Another – Elena (Victoria Kizko) – unrequitedly goes crazy for Demetrius, who is in a love haze from Hermia. Forest forces shamelessly interfere in the course of events in the person of the king of the fairies and elves Oberon (Mark Burlai) and his chief elf Peck (Egor Popov).

An indispensable element of comedy – confusion – will not keep you waiting: the head elf will pour love juice into the eyes of the wrong person, which will cause a lot of trouble. Lysander, who had just held Hermia in his arms, will turn away from the poor thing, suddenly falling in love with Helen, from whom Demetrius is now going crazy, rejecting her to the point of intoxicating drops, like a leper. But the most critical blunder came out with the majestic Titania (Irina Vybornova): her chosen one was a donkey, in which the artisan Osnova reincarnated. True, before such a metamorphosis, Osnova rehearsed the play in the company of his own kind of commoners.

Anton Yakovlev, who is still not among the specialists of the comedy genre, in his “Dream” somehow easily and charmingly brought together the divine and the earthly, the magical and the comical, and he will bring the comedy to a sparkling farce. In the unceremonious treatment of Shakespeare, he is not noticed, but he does not bow in front of him either. Titania was made a capricious prima donna, in conflict with Oberon over the role of Juliet, which he does not want to give to the young actress for anything. He introduced an unexpected character – a make-up artist / costume designer named Lucy (Lyudmila Gavrilova), who grumpily drags herself behind the prima donna’s tail.

Rehearsals of artisans with Pigva (Anton Lyzo) is another farce, where Osnova (Kirill Kovbas) is the soloist, bright, impudent, under which Robin Zamorysh (Pavel Komarov), Snout (Andrey Rebenkov), Milyaga (Andrey Zlobin), Dudka (Denis) are built Lukin). Craftsmen improvise, bully the audience, play musical instruments. Shakespeare – from rock music to opera classics, live sound in combination with a soundtrack. Andrey Zlobin is responsible for the music in the performance, who played the artisan Milyaga in a funny way. The finished performance will be played in the Japanese style – with Japanese abracadabra and hara-kiri. And the finale will be spectacularly performed under Pigvoy’s Nessun dorma from Puccini’s opera Turandot.

I must say that not only the audience, but also the actors recruited at the beginning of the season by Yakovlev, and the actors of the older generation who worked in the Gogol Theater long before Kirill Serebrennikov came there, it is clear that they get tremendous pleasure from playing the game, and the character of each can be seen, especially in static scenes. However, there are not so many of them: the action, full of events, has a rigid rhythm, develops rapidly.

Judging by the way events are developing, we can say that Gogol’s theater is gaining momentum. Two notable performances on the Small Stage (before “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” the aesthetic “The Picture of Dorian Gray” directed by Konstantin Mishin was shown here) give advances for successful work on the Main Stage as well. At the end of April, they promise to present a large-scale production here – The Thunderstorm, staged again by Anton Yakovlev. Thunderstorm in early May? Forces of nature to help.