Moscow Art Theater Gorky revealed plans for the season

Vladimir Kekhman will open the theater after renovation earlier than promised

Moscow Art Theater Gorky opens a new, 125th season. There are many events and surprises. General director Vladimir Kekhman and chief director Galina Polishchuk announced this at a troupe gathering at the theater on Tverskoy Boulevard.

You won’t get bored with Kekhman – his plans change instantly, depending on the circumstances and requirements of the time. Thus, the completion of the renovation, scheduled for March, sharply reversed from spring to this fall, and the general director promises to open the theater at the end of November. This is a great achievement of the construction genius Vladimir Kekhman. However, everyone is waiting for the development of the artistic vector of the theater, especially in its anniversary year. And it was designated by the new chief director Galina Polishchuk.

– Theater cannot exist separately from what is happening in the country and the world – a banal phrase, but this is true. And this is exactly what the Moscow Art Theater has always been. This is what, 125 years later, will determine his artistic policy. The choice of productions and, most importantly, their forms, will meet two aspects: the Moscow Art Theater as a successor to the traditions of Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko, and the traditions of Doronina. Therefore, we preserve and restore those masterpieces that were born here and can only exist here. We save by breathing in something new.

And the second aspect is innovative steps for the Moscow Art Theater, in connection with which we are already talking about a new post-dramatic history of the Art Theater. We are already doing such performances, and I see how much the actors like it, and with what new energy and excitement the Moscow Art Theater is beginning to exist. The form of post-dramatic theater suits today’s times like no other – it expands the possibilities of artistic expression, dialogue and the ability to speak with the viewer in their language about what irritates, what hurts.

We are starting to work with such forms of post-dramatic theater as quotation, deconstruction of content, paraphrasing, changing the plot, and so on, and in this regard, the Moscow Art Theater is a virgin. Therefore, master classes for actors “beats of living space”, once developed by Grotovsky and Brook, will appear.

After such a speech, Polishchuk announced the list of upcoming premieres. Two of them are the same reconstructions that she spoke about at the very beginning. This is “Three Sisters” – the famous production by V.I. Nemirovich-Danchenko 1943, the restoration is being carried out by the oldest Moscow Art Theater worker Sergei Desnitsky. The title roles will be played by Natalya Medvedeva, Vera Desnitskaya and Valentina Stolkovich, a Serbian by nationality who studied at a Russian theater school. Natasha will be played by the already famous actress Agniya Kuznetsova.

The second restoration is “Vassa,” in which Tatyana Doronina brilliantly played the main role. In the new version, the title role will be played by Lidiya Matasova. Victor Kramer’s play “The Forest” returns to the academic stage.

Galina Polishchuk herself is preparing the premiere of Maxim Gorky’s play “At the Lower Depths” for January. The owners of the shelter are Alexander and Ekaterina Strizhenov, but the director gave the role of the elder Luke to the young Andrei Veshkurtsev, who became popular after the role of Sergei Yesenin. The remaining inhabitants of the famous flophouse are the young staff of the Moscow Art Theater.

The approach to the production is thorough.

—In “At the Bottom” we provide a snapshot of what is typical in society, we spend a lot of time outside the theater, we bring dialogues, observations of the most difficult things, clinics. There will be a lot of quoting from films, mass media – today’s “tramps,” explains Galina Polishchuk. “But this will be an unconditional ode to man, to man of action, strength, morality… It seems to me that today this is extremely necessary.” Hope, faith in oneself, in one’s strengths, in one’s capabilities—this is how Gorky’s prime minister should become.

Well, after exploring the social bottom of the Moscow Art Theater will begin to explore the world of theater from the sidelines. The American comedy “Balagan” by Charles Maury can help, showing the opposite side of the theater, hidden from the viewer. The director of the production is Alexander Dmitriev.