Yuri Grymov: Everything I do in theater and cinema, I do about a woman

On September 10, the Modern Theater starts a new season. This will be preceded by an open rehearsal of the new performance. On the eve of our columnist talks with the artistic director of the group Yuri Grymov.

– Yuri Vyacheslavovich, what will surprise you, and what prompted you to make Leonardo Da Vinci the title character of your new performance?

— Yes, we are opening a new theatrical season tomorrow. We open with the play “Leonardo” – the second of the trilogy announced by me “Antichrist and Christ”. The first – about Peter I – is already underway, and quite successfully.

Also in the new season at the end of January, I will start rehearsing the play “Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District” based on Nikolai Leskov.

Well, by the end of the season, we will start doing the third part of the trilogy – Judas.

From joyful events: we have a lot of new actors – both young people and middle-aged people who have replenished our diverse, and I’m not afraid of these words, one of the best corpses in Moscow.

Why is Leonardo da Vinci so interesting to you? Why exactly him? And what new facet does this character bring to your trilogy?

– This is the most difficult character. Leonardo da Vinci carried both Christ and the Antichrist, fifty-fifty percent. He combined it in equal proportions, in my opinion.

After all, I have been painting since childhood, the Renaissance with its brightest representatives – Leonardo, Michelangelo, Raphael, is unusually close to me. And I am immensely happy that now we are actively completing the rehearsal period. I am happy that we were able to raise such an interesting topic – the topic of the Artist, who for me is more an alchemist than an artist (in no case do I want to offend anyone). Because if Michelangelo is more perceived by me as a great artist with his concentration of passion, then Leonardo is perceived as a great person, who combined many different geniuses in himself, and who has a very contradictory attitude towards love. Great love visited him almost already in his old age, Gioconda, too, was already an elderly married woman. What did he come to, knowing this amazing feeling for a woman? After all, he had been running from love all his life, telling his students that a true artist should always be alone.

Therefore, for me it will be such a … sensual performance, I allow myself a lot there. You understand: the Renaissance, plague, poisoning, poisons, envy. And what did Pope Julius II and the people around him do? What they did proves that they were completely immersed in sin. After all, the Pope once said that he ordered the Sistine Chapel of Michelangelo only so that on his deathbed she would outweigh all his sins. And there were sins for a whole era, judging by the biography and actions.

— Well, why at this stage of your spiritual quest did you get the idea to stage “Lady Macbeth…”?

— This is the toughest work of great Russian literature. I am interested in exploring the theme of passion, the theme of a woman (after all, I still remember a wonderful performance in Mayakovka with Natalya Gundareva). And everything that I do in the theater or in the cinema, I do about a woman. I am interested in women – and my film “Kukotsky’s Case”, and the fact that I once graduated from obstetrics courses – everything that is connected with a woman is interesting to me. “Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District” is the brightest work of Russian literature. It seems to me that the performance will be especially interesting today for young people.

– Are there usually a lot of young people in your hall?

— Yes, fortunately. It seems to me that young people are now developing a tremendous interest in great Russian literature: we have a full house both on War and Peace and on the same Peter I. People want to learn Russian literature through theater, especially those who missed it in the school curriculum. Theater “Modern” takes the liberty of talking about the great Russian culture.

Elena Bulova.

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