“Lisa doesn’t die with us. We are kind”

On December 14, the world premiere of the two-act ballet “The Queen of Spades” will take place at the Bolshoi Theater. The score based on Tchaikovsky’s opera of the same name and other works by the composer was created by Yuri Krasavin, the performance was staged by Yuri Possokhov with the participation of playwright Valery Pecheykin. The new “Spade” was designed by Polina Barkhina (sets and costumes) and Gleb Filshtinsky (lighting), and the stage director is Pavel Klinichev. On the eve of the premiere, choreographer Yuri Posokhov told Tatiana Kuznetsova about the details of the production, about the artists, about disputes with composer Krasavin and about why this time he is staging the play without a director.

— We first talked about “The Queen of Spades” back in the summer (see Kommersant on July 24). Then you complained that due to the dense repertoire of artists, you are staging in tiny fragments and are not sure that you will be in time for the premiere. Did you make it?

– Managed. All ballet material was done three weeks ago. Still, this system works here – stage it in parts and start long before the premiere.

— Vyacheslav Samodurov chose the same method. In November he staged “The Tempest” in parallel with you, but its premiere is scheduled only for the summer. How were the artists divided?

– Of course, I had priority. Sometimes Slava sat in an empty hall, waiting for the artists. But he started working before I came here the second time, so he had time to do something. Well, yes, you have to accept that the work schedule is difficult, you have to prepare yourself mentally and physically. I recently met him and said: “Okay, I’m done. Start now at full strength.” After our premiere he will continue, there is still time. I wish Slava success, because he is a very talented person.

— Did your “Queen of Spades” turn out to be a big one?

— Two hours of pure choreography. So many. Moreover, everything is so rich that it seems that I went too far. But let’s see how it looks in costumes and decorations…

— How does your “Queen of Spades” differ from Pushkin’s?

— Valera and I (Pecheykin.— “Kommersant”) came to the conclusion that we still need to take Tchaikovsky’s opera as a basis. Firstly, the music was written for an opera. Secondly, a romantic relationship between Lisa and Hermann is necessary. Still, ballet needs love, it needs passion, and against the backdrop of this passion everything else plays out – gambling scenes, madness and all sorts of phantasmagoria. But we are still moving away from the opera libretto.

– How exactly?

– Well, in particular, Lisa does not die with us. We are kind.

– In general, Hermann loves Lisa, and she loves him. Does he need money to marry her?

– Well, not so simplified. He has a double purpose, and that’s the tragedy. He can’t choose. And in the end he realizes what he has lost.

— So the Countess turned out to be a joker in his inner game?

– No, the Countess is a fateful, demonic phenomenon for us. She practically flies. All the time, without stopping. Mostly after death, in the second act.

— Since 2015, you have been staging your fourth full-length story ballet at the Bolshoi Theater – and for the first time without a director. Why?

— There have been problems with directors here lately, I’m tired of problems. I want to be the only one responsible for what I do. But in general, I direct everywhere alone, I just worked with directors in Russia. A co-author with a different mentality was important to me. I wanted the director to pull out of me something that is not inherent in me, something that I myself am not aware of.

— And now the screenwriter has replaced the director?

— No, but Valera’s role is very important. He went to rehearsals, wrote down everything in order to make my directorial changes to the libretto. Well, he made sensible suggestions – on the characters, along the lines of relationships between the characters. No, he’s a big help.

– How did you find him?

— Valera from Gogol Center. His to me Demutsky (composer Ilya Demutsky, author of music for the ballets “Hero of Our Time” and “Nureev.”— “Kommersant”) suggested when he and I were making Anna Karenina in America, and we needed a libretto. We had a good connection, I really liked the collaboration between the playwright and the director-choreographer.

— In what century do the events of your “Queen of Spades” take place?

– Such a generalized 19th century. In our ballet, we have balls and love relationships that look good in conventionally romantic costumes. And the music is not modern either. To some extent, this is our fantasy on the themes of the century before last – scenery and costumes…

– Conditional? But is the Countess’s chair real?

– This is the last thing left on the stage. Well, a couple more benches. And so you’re on your feet all the time.

—Are the costumes comfortable for the actors? After all, artists love to express themselves in such a way that it is impossible to dance in their “objects”.

– We are fighting them. The sewing shop periodically calls and begs for help. But nothing changes the minds of artists. They always want something bigger, more original. The fight is strong, yes. Let’s see who wins.

— For two hours of dancing you need a lot of music. What works did the composer use besides opera?

— There is something from overtures, poems, there is definitely a fragment from Francesca da Rimini. It’s unusual, and not all orchestra members and not all conductors accepted this music. For some reason, many people think that it is blasphemous to change something from Tchaikovsky. But it seems to me that it turned out natural, lively and fit perfectly into the ballet. I am very grateful to Krasavin.

— Did you participate in the selection of music or did you surrender to the will of the composer?

– I gave in completely. But we recited the scenes; their dramaturgy was important to us. And ballet specifics: sometimes he did not understand what the adagio of the main characters was, why do it at all – at first there was not a single adagio in the ballet.

— Krasavin is not new to ballet, is he?

– But he writes modern ballets, makes some symphonic poems. And here there is a dramatic thing, a clear musical dramaturgy is needed. I heard a small piece of his own “Queen of Spades”, which he wrote for Nizhny Novgorod, absolutely phenomenal music. But here we had to argue. Sometimes he made me do things I didn’t want to do. We bargained: okay, I’ll do this for you, and you leave me this. It was funny.

– And what did you not want to do, but had to give in?

— Well, let’s say, in the opera Tomsky sings five verses and tells how the countess received three cards at Versailles. I say: “You can’t put it on the verses, because it’s the same thing – a continuous “la-la, la-la-la.” And he: “No, here I have musical development. I won’t give up a note!” Thank God, I had a break from work, I went home, rested and decided that it was easier to do than to argue further. And we ended up with a large composition about Versailles. True, I still cut off one verse.

– So, one crowd scene is Versailles, and the second is a ball?

– And also a massive game of cards. In general, we came up with what we could, but we had the task of staging a play for the Historical Stage. We need to fill it somehow, this scene.

— Are there many people busy?

— Oh, I didn’t count… 60 people for sure. There are enough roles for everyone.

-Who are the main characters?

— The first cast includes Igor Tsvirko as Hermann, Liza Kokoreva as Lisa and Slava Lopatin as Countess. The second composition is Lantratov-Sevenard-Savin, the third is Putintsev, Nastya Stashkevich and Gosha Gusev.

— In the summer, you also called Eva Sergeenkova, the rising star of the Bolshoi. Balletomanes are gossiping that you took it off, and after it, young Hermann, Dima Smilevski, left in protest.

“Unfortunately, they undertrained their parts.” If they learn it, they will dance. But in general I am very pleased with the artists. Sometimes I forget during rehearsals that I am a choreographer and just watch how they move. Please repeat it again, and I look at them as a spectator, just admiring them. These young guys are a phenomenal generation. They haven’t danced like this before. And they didn’t dance that much. But we still work a lot: now they seem to be appropriating this choreography, our process goes on non-stop.