Pendel down: why did Khamatova troll Akhedzhakova

People’s Artist of Russia Chulpan Khamatova, who voluntarily left the country a year ago and is weighed down by her title, publicly, in video format, naturally stood up for another People’s Artist of Russia, Lia Akhedzhakova. The reason is quite understandable: the directorate of the Sovremennik Theater suddenly paused the play The Gin Game with the participation of Liya Medzhidovna. Khamatova’s noble impulse to stand up for her older friend? Undoubtedly. All the more so that colleagues in the theater were silent (silence is a sign of consent?), And here is the shoulder of a friend, a helping hand from an unfriendly far away, and even from a self-exiled one. But actually, I’m talking about something else – how did the artist comment on this fact and why?

After listening to Chulpan’s speech, for some reason I didn’t really believe her. She really doubted that what happened to her former colleague in the theater at Chistye Prudy really hurt her so much, which made her heart ache, her brain exploded. The purity of her thoughts somehow does not fit into the new context of the artist’s life: no, not the 84-year-old Akhedzhakova, but she, Khamatova, worries herself most of all, her pain about herself. Akhedzhakova is a reason to remind yourself: so that they don’t forget, so that the Sovremennik Theater and their native country don’t relax.

But what do we hear? A wonderful miracle, a wonderful miracle: it turns out that because of Akhedzhakova, Khamatova came to Sovremennik, Akhedzhakova is a synonym for Sovremennik, its personification and the best that is in it.

Well, let’s say we all died, let’s say we weren’t born at that moment in our lives when a talented GITIS graduate who worked at RAMT, at the invitation of Galina Volchek, ended up at Chistye Prudy. And Oleg Efremov, Galina Volchek, Lilia Tolmacheva, Igor Kvasha, Evgeny Evstigneev, Oleg Tabakov, Valentin Gaft, Nina Doroshina, Lyudmila Ivanova, Tatyana Lavrova, Alla Pokrovskaya, Marina Neyolova, Avangard Leontiev, Elena Yakovleva, Olga Drozdova, did not work there at all, Inna Timofeeva, Alena Babenko, Vlad Vetrov, Sergey Yushkevich… What to do with them? And what else is alive and continuing to work to receive such a pendel down? Just like amnesia struck the intercessor, offending her former colleagues and the theater, which made her the Chulpan that they knew and loved even before … An important clarification: they respected a professional artist, and not a professional wrestler with all the ensuing side effects.

But when an artist or actress moves into the category of a political fighter, he (she) seems to forget everything and live on the political agenda, everything is made up for it. And today we have on the agenda – Liechka Akhedzhakova, deprived of the performance. This means that it is necessary to “drown” sort of like “for” her, but in fact against the regime. Tomorrow will be something else.

Well, as for Liya Medzhidovna, Khamatova’s intercession came out exactly like a disservice. Trolling some of the best political intentions. Spectators, distrustful of their opinion, ask in bewilderment: they say, is the secretary from “Office Romance” really a “brilliant Russian actress”, as Khamatova assures, or do we not understand something? Or can we not distinguish the main role from the role of the second or third plan? Or are we being taken for fools who do not understand who made Khamatova in Sovremennik (this is Galina Volchek) and Akhedzhakova in the cinema (this is Eldar Ryazanov)? That Liya Medzhidovna, if we talk about the profession seriously and without lies, is definitely a bright, memorable actress, in the large palette of our art in general and Sovremennik in particular. And this paint needs a director like air. The weakest play “First Bread” by a little-known Polish director (it is no longer being staged due to poor ticket sales) showed this: she needs a director, she needs it. But this is a conversation about the profession without lying, and not about politics, the hostages of which have finally become Chulpan Khamatova and Liya Akhedzhakova.

And it has completely different laws, techniques, schemes, well-developed by those who are not engaged in theater, but in political technologies. As a result of these schemes, already performed in the image and with the actor’s presentation, another myth is formed in the audience about brilliant actors, all the genius of which is in politicking, about honest directors, all of whose honesty is in burned documents.

As for the play The Gin Game, the question is for the management of Sovremennik: was it worth blocking the play, which nevertheless brought income to the theater, whose third season is not doing very well because of letters from workers? And this Game of Gin is not seditious, not anti-patriotic: a good old American play about two old people in a boarding house for the elderly and a philosophical message about the end of life. The one who made the decision to close (in the absence of the artistic director, obviously, director Y. Kravets), remains silent – probably in the hope that the noise around Akhedzhakova will somehow dissipate itself. Let this act remain on the conscience of those who committed it, as well as in the history of the Sovremennik Theater.

Published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Komsomolets” No. 28972 dated February 15, 2023

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Why did Khamatova troll Akhedzhakova