January 17 all theater world celebrates the 155th anniversary of Konstantin Sergeevich Stanislavsky. We are used to his photographs. The face is stern and elongated. The forehead is high. Full lips compressed. Pince-nez. Behind the transparent glass is a heavy and, if you look closely, intense gaze through a narrow squint. Together with Nemirovich-Danchenko he created the Moscow Art Theater. In his old age he fell behind the times and lived as a recluse in Leontyevsky Lane. What other stories and fables have been heard about the CS? What is the truth and what is gossip?

In today's information flow, where the significant and the empty, facts and fakes are hopelessly confused, it is increasingly difficult to concentrate in order to evaluate significant and lasting events, not to confuse them with fleeting events without a long destiny. Sometimes we make mistakes and push into the past trends or phenomena that, in fact, are destined for a very long time. long life. This happens from time to time with Stanislavsky and his long-suffering system.

IN Soviet years they tried to force it on everyone. IN educational process theater universities, it, one-sidedly understood, ideologically adapted, was the indisputable basis of the foundations and began to seem not only outdated, but initially disastrous, while the theater was being renewed rapidly and radically.

Meanwhile, against the backdrop of witty ridicule and serious discussions, Stanislavsky and his system confidently, naturally and undeclaratively grew into the new creative reality as one of its important elements. This lesson, taught by history, has unfortunately been almost forgotten today.

Paradox. But the main reformers of the sixties - Oleg Efremov, Anatoly Efros, Georgy Tovstonogov - in their work with actors relied on Stanislavsky and his system. Efremov went even further, he followed KS in studio experiments, calling Sovremennik the last studio Art Theater. And even Yuri Lyubimov, creating Taganka as a conventional theater, even when he was an actor, diligently attended a seminar on the Stanislavsky system at the WTO, which was led by M.N. Kedrov. At the same time, he was one of the few who did not quit classes completely...

Today, theaters positioning themselves as a new stage phenomenon cannot ignore what Stanislavsky did. In our changing world there is something that does not disappear over time. And whenever the law of gravity was discovered, the apple still falls today.

Stanislavsky is one of our most amazing, powerful artists along with Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Tchaikovsky, he is a “face” for the whole world Russian culture. He was an outstanding actor, director, he wrote one of the best, and maybe even the best book in the world about the theater, “My Life in Art.” It was released in many languages ​​and is still recruiting new viewers and actors to the theater. It was his tall and active genius that helped Russian theater to become an influential creative force, to enter the center of world theatrical processes.

But perhaps the most important thing he worked on until the end of his days was his system. By creating a manual for actors, theater teachers and directors, he took a long-awaited and necessary step towards human science. One of the most difficult, at that time just beginning its now victorious march. In the theater (and this is its uniqueness), next to elements invented and created artificially, there is a living person who must transform himself into someone else. Not only externally, but also internally, that is, somehow make these invisible and unknown strings resonate. This means that first of all you need to understand the real nature of the game, and then consciously, psychologically competently gain power over these processes. System instead of chaos. Regular instead of random. Alive in all its free unpredictability.

Stanislavsky was lucky and unlucky. He was lucky because his life coincided with the beginning of global conversion, when history suddenly accelerated, and the world was transformed beyond recognition before the eyes of one generation. Those born by candlelight and horse-drawn carriages lived to see the telegraph, electricity, trains, and airplanes. Their consciousness had to integrate into the changing reality all the time. Today we are in a similar situation, and therefore we can appreciate it. This element of universal change influenced scientific and creative consciousness, as well as everyday consciousness. Art was changing. The genius of Stanislavsky discerned the logic of the future in these changes. And he went to meet her.

But the time allotted to his generation was also a time of monstrous trials. Here is a simple listing of the most significant: the revolution of 1905, the war with Japan, the First world war, two more revolutions, another war, this time the Civil War, NEP, collectivization, repressions of the thirties... And all this fit inside one not-so-long human life.

What strength of spirit and will to creativity was needed to engage in art under these conditions. He went through all the trials without losing either his fortitude or his integrity. Having lost all the factories and usual means, he stated: “I have become a proletarian.” And he continued to live and work as if it had always been this way. In the dangerous pre-revolutionary war years, he also clearly formulated the situation in which the country found itself: “You cannot live in Russia without a pistol.” Yes, he was afraid of drowning, he preferred to sail only on those ships that had three funnels. But at the same time he was a strong man who knew how to take the situation into his own hands. He also behaved firmly in art, defending his opinion before the highest authorities, including Stalin.

We know too little of the real Stanislavsky and rely too much on anecdotes. On the day of his next anniversary, it is worth saying that Stanislavsky (however, not only he alone) needs not a fleeting anniversary interest. It is no substitute for daily, honest study of his works and his life. It was a great and difficult life, the experience of which both in art and in society will be useful to future generations.

LYUBIMOV

Time not only steals details from past events, but also gradually compresses these events, compacts life into history. By uniting and filtering out what seems unimportant from the point of view of the “main processes,” it drives crowds of famous names under the same terms. The force of compression increases over the years as witnesses disappear.

So the 60s, still very recent, are rapidly losing their living appearance, intonation, and colors. Like everything else, they dry out. Their full-blooded, mobile, polyphonic reality turns into an illustration of historical processes. Many contradictions fall into two main heaps. The darkness of different, very different “new” people (all this motley post-thaw motley grass) begins to cluster into a single column of “sixties”, suspiciously similar to one another in creativity and in life. The social nature of the confrontations of that time often obscures in the minds of new generations not only the uniqueness of individuals, but also one of the most important dominant features of the time: a fundamental and rapid change in artistic trends in most, or more precisely, in all types of art.

And one more thing. Political struggle post-Stalin years, pushing away from the recent totalitarian past does not allow one to properly discern one of the surprising trends for Russia in the 60s: the split in those days took place not according to age, which determines position, as most often happens (and is today) in our country, but according to positions to which all ages were submissive. It was they who united or separated the “fathers” who had conquered in a terrible war and the “children” who grew up in the hungry, cold rear.

Yuri Petrovich Lyubimov was born at the very end of September 1917. A little over a month before the October revolution. His life experience, which included the most tragic and dark periods of Soviet history, bore little resemblance to the experience of most of those with whom he made his unexpected theater. It would be difficult to imagine that not a young (he was already over forty), quite prosperous, well-loved actor of a privileged capital theater named after Evgeniy Vakhtangov, who acted a lot and successfully (the whole country knew him from his films), never directed, Lyubimov will suddenly start everything with clean slate. He will decisively put aside his beautifully developing acting career (even an honorary title will not be written on the poster) and suddenly, for everyone, he will appear at the forefront of the struggle, social and aesthetic, in which the fate of not only art, but also the country was then decided. And at the same time he will be one of the most courageous politically, and in theatrical practice he will prove himself to be an independent director, without any seemingly preliminary preparation mastered the secrets of the most complex, rare profession. Who would have thought that it was he, Oleg Koshevoy of the Vakhtangov stage, who would turn into one of the most dynamic and attractive figures in the art of those days. That Taganka, created by him, will become not only the brightest theater, but decisively and for a long time (the traces of its best, heretically free performances have not been trampled to this day) will influence the entire artistic process in the country.

It seemed that time was working against Lyubimov: he was “late” not only in age, but also in the situation itself. Renewal in the Soviet theater has taken place: performances by Efremov, Tovstonogov and Efros were staged, in which a challenge to the dead dogmas of the theater of the cult era was staged; the plays of Volodin, Rozov, Arbuzov, and a little later - Radzinsky had already brought onto the stage the acute problems of a new, really current life, decisively displacing the struggle between the good and the best, as required by the theory of conflictlessness. And the actors in Sovremennik, Efros, and Tovstonogov played differently than their colleagues on traditionally frozen stages. The struggle around Stanislavsky’s system, which had been turned into dogma, also began. The directors and actors who built the modern theater resurrected what was truly alive in it, discarding what had been canonized and perverted.

In the theatrical process of those days, the main directions of struggle were revealed: against censorship restrictions at the text level, against stage routine, and the difficult legacy of socialist realism. Each of the newcomers who entered the game either ended up in the camp of constantly persecuted rebels, or joined the conformists, continuers of the “traditions” approved by the authorities. No sensations were expected.

And yet, although the game seemed to have already been played, the sudden appearance of Lyubimov with his “The Good Man from Szechwan” (the graduation performance of the Shchukin School) made an indelible impression. It became immediately clear: he had caught the living, sharp impulses of time.

Social time. Aesthetic time. And last but not least – psychological.

From today, when the scenes are so colorful and permissive, when you can no longer surprise with anything, it is impossible to imagine how crushing, indeed surprising, the effect of “The Good Man of Szechwan” was. Everything about this performance was different from others. A witty, confidently eclectic convention that left the impression of the most natural artistic integrity. Strange because it is unusually personal, journalistic, permeated not with loud pathos, but with a trusting, lyrical intonation. A combination of young, joyfully aggressive stage hooliganism and the kindness suffered by humanity throughout its history. Brecht's social parable remained in the play, as the author of the play intended, as a story about society. But this society was not just a political category. It consisted of many destinies of very simple, very understandable people who lived recognizable lives on stage. But at the same time, the events that took place in the Shen Te tobacco shop were depicted through demonstratively frank theatrical acting on a bright, almost empty (only contours and details) stage. Here's the dance could replace a declaration of love. Bottles of kefir (the food of the gods) appeared from a plywood cloud. Crowd scenes introduced the elements of a plastically forced everyday scandal. And the zongs, filled with the harsh energy of protest, dissected the performance, changing its atmosphere and rhythms.

Everything here was conditional. But this was a completely unfamiliar convention. Happy, lively, impudent, she burst out of the stage box into the hall, turning into the truth of momentary contacts between actors and spectators. The performance seemed to be teasing, teasing, mocking excessive seriousness, aesthetic “dos and don’ts,” social constraint, and psychological stereotypes. The performers did not hide behind a “realistic” image, but they did not hide behind the mask created during the game. Experience and performance were combined in their art through the authenticity of the actor's human personality, understanding of the purpose and nature of the game. Through pressure-merging with the audience, excluding any hint of the “fourth wall”.

This performance did not fake a single semantic or artistic moment, although it was riskily varied in techniques, textures, and excessive in the number used by the director expressive means. But the most amazing and fundamental thing is that it combines the subtlest, most precise psychological nuances and bold to the point of rudeness, reckless, unbridled play. Theatrically dashing, he was humane and kind. Youthful and cheerful - wise and sad. Here, a different space for creative exploration opened up, different scenic trends emerged, interrupted by the repressions and prohibitions of Stalin’s time. And one of the features of the time of the 60s emerged, its special humanitarian mission: building bridges, connecting beginnings and ends. The most dynamic processes of art of the 20s, cruelly cut off, began to move. Destroyed in theory, hidden from the future in special storage facilities, physically eradicated in the person of its brilliant representatives, the Great Conventional Theater gave its voice from long oblivion. The fallen, but alive (to paraphrase the title of one of the Tagansky performances) returned to duty.

Lyubimov played a leading role in this connection of the “ends” of the past with the future through the art of today. And it was no coincidence that he hung three portraits in the foyer of Taganka: Meyerhold, Vakhtangov, Brecht. Vigilant cultural officials immediately demanded that Meyerhold’s portrait be removed (the Master’s creative rehabilitation had barely begun) and that Stanislavsky’s portrait be hung in its place. Clean up Yu.P. he didn’t, but he still didn’t give up Stanislavsky. It should be noted right away that this is not exactly a compromise: Lyubimov attended the Laboratory according to the Stanislavsky system, which in the 50s was taught at the All-Russian Theater Society by Mikhail Kedrov, a direct student of K.S. And while building the theater, he boldly and perspicaciously united what was once opposed to each other. With all his being, with his intuition, he felt: the time for synthesis had come. So to this day, in complete agreement, these four portraits hang in the blackened foyer, each expressing in its own way the multidimensional, multi-absorbed art of Taganka.

Discussing the performances of Y.P., which followed “The Good Man from Szechwan” already at Taganka, the critics of that time did not pay too much attention to the role of Stanislavsky in the formation of Lyubimov’s directorial technique, but more than once recalled Meyerhold. This connection was striking. It’s not a matter of direct imitation, it’s not a matter of external re-imitation, of course, but a deep genetic connection through a brilliant director with a stage tradition lost in centuries and millennia, to which Aristophanes, the commedia dell’arte, and the great Shakespeare belong. And – our theatrically brilliant 20s. These initial connections were especially deeply and clearly reflected in Taganka’s performances after the outstanding modern set designer David Borovsky came to the theater. Together with Lyubimov, in a happy, creative unanimity, rare for art, they created a series of amazing performances, performances-revelations, these artistic werewolves who knew how to be rude in an area and sophisticatedly spiritual, stage flesh and mirages. “And the dawns here are quiet...”, “Hamlet”, “Comrade, believe...”, “Wooden Horses”, “House on the Embankment” and so on, and so on... Almost immediately after the premiere, the performances turned into legends, into theatrical classics.

Something else is also important. In Lyubimov’s very first performance, it was discovered that he managed to create a special acting school, a completely unique way of acting for our theater. At that time, everyone was engaged in the problems of acting art that would meet the requirements of the theater of modern times. But the technique demonstrated by Lyubimov’s students bore little resemblance to what Oleg Efremov in Sovremennik or Anatoly Efros in Lenkom (and later on Bronnaya) sought from their actors. Open, exaggerated, jubilant theatricality was the strength of Tagansky performances. It is no coincidence that Lyubimov valued Pushkin’s thought so much: “What the hell can be believable in a hall divided into two parts, one of which is occupied by 2 thousand people, as if invisible to those on the stage.” From the very beginning, his actors existed without any “as if”. They not only saw the viewer, but also entered into continuous communication with him.

With his performances, Lyubimov penetrated into the secret area of ​​​​the energies of the game, changing the strength and quality of energy bursts into the auditorium. Communication within the play, as if between its characters, observed by the audience from the outside, he did not so much reduce to a minimum, not at all, but screened it in a completely different way - through the viewer. It was unique technique, not rationally calculated, not invented, but born intuitively as a result of Lyubimov’s incredible sensitivity to what is living, momentary, organically characteristic of a person on stage.

Such a technique is today already a legend of deep antiquity. It did not receive proper theater evaluation and was not enshrined either in theory or in pedagogical practice. In those life-giving Tagan years, Lyubimov was not allowed to take a new student course. And then it became too late. Gone is the very texture of time, capable of awakening in an actor such a force of personal presence, the need to express one’s own pros and cons, the ability to see something much more significant than his personal destiny in art and life.

On best performances At the theater, the spectator experienced an unsettling contact with the stage, falling under the influence of an unfamiliar and powerful energy rushing across the ramp. This pressure, very powerful in itself, seemed only part of some kind of energetic immensity, as if through the “funnel” of the stage everything that had accumulated in human souls, society, and the world was rushing into the hall. Taganka, as a medium, broadcast a certain psychoenergetic space of confrontation, struggle, social courage. But also the joys of creativity and mutual understanding.

The Taganka acting technique was based not only on Lyubimov’s free artistic practice, but also on the internal emancipation of Taganka’s behind-the-scenes life and work, and the pre-performance unity of everyone.

Today, in a situation of ever-increasing egocentrism, the fact that the 60s were distinguished not only by the severity of the confrontation between the totalitarian system and its liberal critics has somehow begun to be forgotten and lost relevance. It was also a time of renewed solidarity and trust between like-minded people. Normal communication between people, forgotten during the period of Stalin's denunciations, fears, and social loneliness, was rapidly revived. It was as if a single space of creativity was opening up anew, and there was an exchange of living artistic ideas, not those grown in the laboratories of socialist realism. Collective action and resistance to government pressure became possible.

For the art of theater, these changes in the social climate were especially important: after all, one cannot work on a performance alone or whispering in corners. The director must be understood and supported by the actors, which means he must be open and frank. Lyubimov, with his temperament, spirit of contradiction, constant desire to clash with the enemy, more than any of his colleagues used the openness of relations in the process rehearsal work as an aesthetic factor. He did not create an obedient troupe of performers, but a group of people who were creatively and humanly bright (many composed music, wrote poetry or prose), independent, even robbers, a kind of Zaporozhye Sich with its Cossack liberties. The rehearsals at Taganka were similar in mood to the famous writing of a letter to the Sultan. The discipline of the performance seemed to speak of the director's dictate. But in no other theater at that time were the actors so free during the rehearsal period, nowhere were their proposals met with such enthusiasm. Not a single director could afford such a degree of informal communication, not everyday, but in creativity, as Lyubimov.

In the Soviet theater, the authorities calculatedly cultivated a special intra-theater hierarchy that would be capable of transforming relations within the troupe from uncontrollably creative to “healthy” bureaucratic. Lyubimov destroyed not only the social or aesthetic canons of that time, but also the associated internal rules of theater life. He was not a boss established by the authorities for the actors, but a leader. In the most difficult moments of the struggle, he could, like the captain from Vysotsky’s song, tell the team: “It’s not evening yet,” and the team believed him. He influenced the atmosphere in the theater by the very fact that he existed, was somewhere here, nearby. The old Taganka building was filled with special energy in his presence. Talent is always a source of invisible but powerful radiation. The director's public talent is even more so. And Lyubimov charged the actors. In the early years he spent almost all his time in the theater. Rehearsed, took care of current affairs. And in the evening I watched the performance and from the back of the hall, from the back door, I signaled with a flashlight when the actors lost their rhythm. Critics loved to make fun of this strangeness of the Master. But he knew that with his flashlight he was entering the performance, returning to it the necessary energy, the one that had been accumulated during rehearsals.

The situation of early Taganka today looks quite typical for like-minded theater groups (the brightest is Oleg Efremov’s Sovremennik), which arose in those years not only in the capitals, but also in the provinces. Moreover, the unanimity seems to have been inherited immediately, growing out of the school relationship between the Master and students. It has become a theatrical stereotype to talk about the course of the Shchukin School, which instantly turned into the Taganka Theater.

In reality, everything was much more complicated. From his first steps as a director, having so easily and quickly received his own theater, Lyubimov was faced with a not at all easy problem.

His business did not arise out of nowhere. The new team was given not an empty building, but the existing Drama and Comedy Theater, which had its own history, its own place in theatrical Moscow, its own reputation, repertoire, and audience. And - its own permanent troupe. Lyubimov had to first of all deal with conflict and difficulty: selection, pushing aside, dismissal. As an experienced theater politician (it was not for nothing that he headed the troupe at the Vakhtangov Theater), he understood that the young studio core did not yet have sufficient artistic strength, that actors of different age groups and different roles were needed. As a person who spent his entire life behind the scenes, he knew that early success in graduation performances does not guarantee a brilliant acting future. He has more than once observed how real theater shuffles young people: it turns yesterday’s geniuses into nothing, but suddenly elevates someone who has vegetated in minor roles all his years of study. The new theater needed a more reliable foundation that could insure yesterday's students and make it easier for them to enter the profession. At first, absolute unanimity had to be sacrificed for the sake of stability, and then it had to be achieved again, in a completely different, very diverse (in terms of age, school, experience, outlook on life) company.

Some of the old troupe were fired, some joined the new team. Some of these newcomers (the director's eye did not disappoint) became their own, played a lot and seemed even more Tagansky than some of Lyubimov's students. The thoroughly Tagan-like Smekhov and Roninson, for example, were “inherited” by Lyubimov. Lyubimov began recruiting actors from outside. Now it’s somehow difficult to realize that it was through such a recruitment that most of its stars got to Taganka: Vysotsky, Zolotukhin, Filatov, Shapovalov, Gubenko, Dykhovichny, Shatskaya, Zhukova. To them we must add Kalyagin, Lyubshin, Eibozhenko, who, also very young, completely unknown, were accepted into the Tagansky troupe (however, after some time they left it, not without reason deciding that they could achieve more alone, in a different theater system) . Moreover, Lyubimov’s course itself turned out to be not so uniform. Not everyone went with the Master into the dangerous unknown, preferring an engagement in an already established theater. So at the opening of Taganka on April 23, 1964, both our own and the “outsiders” played completely indistinguishably in “The Good Man from Szechwan”. The performance remained the same in its artistic and social nature. Common language was found reliably and quickly. Lyubimov for short term managed to bring everyone to a common denominator.

The public face of Taganka appeared definitely and quickly. To the horror of the officials overseeing the culture, the darling actor showed not only a scenic, but also a remarkable political temperament. With each performance the theater became bolder, its conversation with auditorium became sharper and more frank. From an aesthetic factor, Taganka steadily grew into a politically influential phenomenon.

Lyubimov perfectly mastered the art of maneuver and skillfully used it. But he liked to go ahead, to do more than what was allowed, and thereby (not only for himself) to push the boundaries of what was permitted. It’s no coincidence that people went to Taganka to experience a little freedom, not that in a narrow circle, with vodka in the famous kitchens of the 60s. No, freedom is not secret, but excitingly public, won every time. We went to participate in something similar to mass social meditation, being surrounded by different people, connected only by the performance. The theater educated new citizens every night for the awakening country. How children's choir in “Galileo”, calling on the hero, wonderfully played by Vladimir Vysotsky, “not to be afraid,” Taganka, by her own example, led the audience to gradually get rid of fears.

Lyubimov not only knew how to fight, he wanted and knew how to win. This rallied the troupe, friends of the theater and spectators even more reliably around him. Even when he lost, he did not agree to consider his loss final. When the performance was banned, he did not rush to retreat, following the example of many of his more obedient colleagues, but resisted. Confident, noisy, all over Moscow. Moreover, he resisted insidiously and inventively. In illegal and dangerous ways. He organized rehearsals, which were attended not only by Moscow actors, directors, critics, and simply friends of the theater, but also by foreign correspondents, diplomats, and guests from abroad. In the eyes of society, the performance acquired the rights of citizenship, became, having not yet received permission for the premiere, part of the artistic process, became overgrown with rumors, delights of the “leaked”, excited crowds in front of the service entrance on the days of the prohibited rehearsals. It was no longer easy to film the play after such Lyubimov’s “antics” quietly, without a big (including international) scandal.

Taganka became something of a free fortress inside theatrical Moscow, from where the sounds of a military trumpet could be heard every now and then. Lyubimov, with his social courage, persistent behavior, harshness in words, with each clash increasingly angered high officials and more and more definitely attracted the sympathy of that part of society that, like the theater, took a critical position in relation to the authorities.

But while building the theater-fortress, Lyubimov did not intend to live in isolation, to take the team away from society into a monastery. Against. Very soon Taganka turned into a haven for dissidents, into a space open to frank, fearless communication. It was more than a theater, rather a kind of club for radical intellectuals and leftist forces. The most resistant and talented, awakened at the first signs of a warming social climate, gathered there. Lyubimov managed not only to unite the troupe, but to somehow expand it, extend it into a variety of spheres of cultural and public life. Poets, prose writers, musicians, scientists, politicians - world-famous and who have barely begun their path to future fame - have become part of Taganka everyday life, and not just an adornment of premieres. These people, very different, very busy, often hard to reach, belonged in the cramped but alluring backstage of the theater. They formed a unique “Taganka circle” of different ages, always ready to defend the theater, the performance, and Lyubimov. Naturally, the Taganka actors, who had access to communication with the intellectual and creative elite of those days, experienced the impact of such communication. And this translated into their energy and their thought, their personal position when they went on stage. This means – into the energy, thought and position of the performance.

There was another, very special circle of friends at Taganka. In this theater, not only real, living ones, but also the authors of performed texts who have left this world became “friends.” Lyubimov sought to build a theater on high literature. Unlike other reformers, he was not seduced modern plays. He turned to literature in its best, although not intended for theater, manifestations. This created an atmosphere of love around the text during rehearsals. It was as if the author entered the hall, sat down next to Lyubimov at the director’s table and, invisible, was present at the performance, entering into an inaudible dialogue with the stage, but felt by the audience. The actors did not just play Pushkin, Mayakovsky, Bulgakov or Shakespeare. They spoke to them as if they were alive to the living. The frailty of the body did not matter, because the soul and creative genius are immortal. Perhaps no one before Lyubimov, with his virtuosic technique of literary compositions, managed to introduce the author’s personality into the performance so clearly and with such exposure of love, understanding, and pain. To convey both frank admiration for the writer’s talent and piercing human sympathy for his creative and non-creative torment. The offensive, sternly masculine intonation of the performances was at the same time touchingly gentle and protective, because, by overthrowing evil, dispelling darkness, the theater wanted to make the source of true light visible to everyone.

Many years have already passed since those wonderful times for Taganka. The atmosphere of the 60s has faded. Lyubimov himself went through a series of trials and vicissitudes. Fate had in store for him more than just copper pipes. Forced emigration. Troupe split. Loss of the new theater building, which was built with such hopes... Finally, the need to work in unfamiliar and contradictory conditions (where the enemy is, where the friend is - you won’t immediately understand) of modern Russia. In the distant, very distant years from youth, to grow into new times, to master new truths... But no matter how the fate of Yuri Petrovich Lyubimov and the Taganka he created developed further, they accomplished their invaluable work in the theatrical and political history of the past twentieth century.

DATES OF LIFE AND WORK

• On September 30, 1917, Yuri Petrovich Lyubimov was born in Yaroslavl.
• 1922 – moves with his parents to Moscow.
• 1936–1939 - studies at the theater school at the Theater. Evg. Vakhtangov.
• 1939 – mobilized into the Red Army.
• 1946–1964 – actor of the Theater. Evg. Vakhtangov. Acting in films.
• 1959–1964 – teaches at the Theater School named after. B.V. Shchukina.
• 1964 – opening of the Taganka Theater. “The Good Man from Szechwan” by B. Brecht, “Hero of Our Time” by M. Lermontov.
• 1965–1975 – at the Taganka Theater: “Antiworlds” by A. Voznesensky, “Ten Days that Shook the World” by D. Reed, “Fallen and Living”, “The Life of Galileo” by B. Brecht, “Listen” by V. Mayakovsky, “Pugachev” by S. Yesenin, “Tartuffe” by J. Molière, “Mother” by M. Gorky, “Rush Hour” by E. Stavinsky, “What to do?” according to N. Chernyshevsky, “And the dawns here are quiet...” according to B. Vasiliev, “Hamlet” by W. Shakespeare, “Under the skin of the Statue of Liberty” according to E. Yevtushenko, “Comrade, believe...” (composition of works and letters of A. Pushkin), “Benefit performance” by A. Ostrovsky, “Wooden horses” by F. Abramov, “Fasten your seat belts” by G. Baklanov and Y. Lyubimov.
• 1975 – production of L. Nono’s opera “Under the Hot Sun of Love” at the La Scala Theater.
• 1976–1978 – at the Taganka Theater: “Exchange” by Yu. Trifonov, “The Master and Margarita” by M. Bulgakov, “Crossroads” by V. Bykov, “Revision Tale” by N. Gogol, “Crime and Punishment” by F. Dostoevsky.
• 1979 – in Hungary he stages “Crime and Punishment” by F. Dostoevsky and “Turandot, or the Congress of the Whitewashers” by B. Brecht. At La Scala - M. Mussorgsky's opera Boris Godunov.
• 1980–1981 - at the Taganka Theater: “House on the Embankment” by Yu. Trifonov, “Three Sisters” by A. Chekhov and “Vladimir Vysotsky”. At La Scala - M. Mussorgsky's opera “Khovanshchina”.
• 1982 – preparing for the production of “Boris Godunov” by A. Pushkin. The performance is prohibited.
• 1982–1984 – works in Europe in opera and drama theaters.
• 1984 – deprived of Soviet citizenship and forced to emigrate from the USSR.
• 1984–1989 – staged performances in different theaters around the world, including at the Arena Stage theater in Washington, at La Scala, at the State Opera in Stuttgart, at Covent Garden, at the Royal drama theater in Stockholm.
• 1989 – returns to the USSR. Chief Director Theater on Taganka. Stages “A Feast in the Time of Plague” by A. Pushkin. At the same time he works in theaters in Europe.
• 1990–1997 – at the Taganka Theater there are released: “The Suicide” by N. Erdman, “Electra” by Sophocles, “Zhivago” by B. Pasternak, “Medea” by Euripides, “Teenager” and “The Brothers Karamazov” by F. Dostoevsky. At the same time, he stages “The Queen of Spades” by P. Tchaikovsky in opera house in Karlsruhe, “The Love for Three Oranges” by S. Prokofiev in Munich, “Nabucco” by G. Verdi in Bonn, etc.
• 1998–2001 – at the Taganka Theater: “Sharashka” by A. Solzhenitsyn, “Marat and the Marquis de Sade” by P. Weiss, “Chronicles” by W. Shakespeare, “Eugene Onegin” by A. Pushkin, “ Theatrical novel” according to M. Bulgakov.

Cultural Observer Gregory Zaslavsky talked about Oleg Efremov with a critic Rimma Krechetova in the "Service Entrance" program on .

Zaslavsky: In the studio Grigory Zaslavsky, hello. And it seemed completely fair to me to dedicate today’s “Service Entrance” to Oleg Nikolaevich Efremov. A new issue of the journal “Theatre Issues” has been published, and it contains an article by the wonderful critic Rimma Pavlovna Krechetova, entirely dedicated to Efremov. In general, this article looks like a book proposal. And I am glad to welcome Rimma Krechetova back to this studio. Rimma Pavlovna, hello.

Krechetova: Hello.

Zaslavsky: You wrote about Efremov, and you know why this article seemed remarkable to me? After all, a theater critic, 15 years after he begins to engage in this strange activity of his, he is surprised to discover that he is no longer just a critic, but he is already becoming a theater historian. And this is not the first time in your life that, having started writing about the Taganka Theater, at some point you became not just a biography writer, but a truly serious historian of these theatrical organisms that were most important for the Russian theater. And now what you write about Efremov is a look completely devoid of some kind of immediacy. You were able to look at Oleg Nikolaevich Efremov, at this outstanding person, completely, as it were, refusing, so to speak, the possibility of “oh, I remember how he smiled at me and said...” In general, this is important, what do you think, for a critic, at some point, to completely distance himself from personal impressions, which in some cases are the other way around, yes, some gossip, some anecdotal detail and tale suddenly become incredibly important to reinforce one’s seemingly serious and theatrical thought?

Krechetova: It seems to me that everything is important. It is important when necessary and when possible. This same reality itself makes it possible to step back and see some larger processes, phenomena, personalities, or it doesn’t, but everything flickers. And at the same time, you probably need to be able to convey some moments, some trifles, because personality sometimes shows itself in trifles. And that’s why both are important. And you can confuse genres. You can write as you like, but it is important that what you write about is close to you, so that you act not as a historian of some process that you don’t care about, but as a historian who lived this process. This is how it is in a critic’s situation: he lives the process, he doesn’t read it in the library, it’s his life. Therefore, the relationship here is completely different.

Zaslavsky: Tell me, about Efremov, is it a true feeling that this will turn into a book, or not?

Krechetova: Well, to be honest, no. Because Sovremennik was for me less of a theater of immediate access, and mine was always at Efros and Taganka. I just didn’t have enough already, I loved him very much, Sovremennik, I went to performances, but I couldn’t get into his rehearsal life, like that. Because when I got carried away, well, carried away is not the right word, it was such an event in our theatrical life when Taganka appeared, and it seemed to push aside everything else for me, and I sat there endlessly at rehearsals, with Efros endlessly. That is, here are the legendary performances, they seemed to have passed for me, and this is how the director’s path to them. I don’t know Efremov in that capacity. I would really like to write about him, but I don’t have such personal access to him. So no, there won’t be a book.

Listen in full in audio version.

Popular

16.01.2020, 10:08

“The task is not to catch up, but to preserve the best”

EVGENY SATANOVSKY: “Sometimes it’s enough not to worsen the situation - if you’re stuck at your level, and your competitors have failed, that’s also normal. Your task is not to catch up, your task is to preserve the best that you have, to gradually gain the best that you can. But the most important thing is not to fail by chasing fashion, the best. This is exactly what has been developing here since the late 80s.”

Other books on similar topics:

See also in other dictionaries:

CINEMA DIRECTOR- DIRECTOR (French regisseur, from Latin regere to manage), in cinema the director of a film. Brings the script to life on screen, directing working together actors, cameraman, artist, composer, etc. involved in the creation of the film. Usually the director's... Encyclopedia of Cinema

OTHER- (Others), USA, Miramax Films, 2001, 101 min. Thriller. In a mansion on one of the islands off the coast of England, in a house where no door should be opened until the previous one is locked, the beautiful Grace and her children are waiting for the end of the Second World War... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

OTHER HYPOSTASES- “OTHER HYPOSTASES” (Altered States) USA, 1980, 102 min. ( full version 150 min.) Aesthetic fantasy film. The attitude towards the attempt of the English “mad genius” Ken Russell to change his identity and try himself in the science fiction genre was... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

ANOTHER FORTY-EIGHT HOURS- “Another 48 HRS” (Another 48 HRS) USA, 1990, 100 min. Action, comedy. The latest adventures of police officer Cates, who must stand trial for abuse of power, and his “partner”, who served his time in prison as a black man... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

French actor and director Jean-Claude Brialy- born on March 30, 1933 in Algeria in the city of Omale (now Sur El Ghozlan) in the family of a French officer. Being on military service, Briali voiced the narration text for army film magazines, and also joined the circle of figures in the magazine “Cahiers du... ... Encyclopedia of Newsmakers

EGOR BULYCHEV AND OTHERS (1953)- “YEGOR BULYCHEV AND OTHERS”, USSR, MOSFILM, 1953, b/w, 159 min. Film performance, drama. Based on the play of the same name by M. Gorky. Performance of the theater named after Evg. Vakhtangov. The director of the play is Boris Zakhava. Artist V. Dmitriev. Cast: Sergey... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

BOUQUET OF MIMOSA AND OTHER FLOWERS- “BOUQUET OF MIMOSA AND OTHER FLOWERS”, USSR, Lenfilm, 1984, color, 105 min. Family psychological drama. The head of the supply department of a large plant is retiring. Parting with the job in which you spent your whole life will be a difficult test... In... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

GORYACHEV AND OTHERS- GORYACHEV AND OTHERS, Russia, 1992 1994. Mini television series. Cast: Igor Bochkin (see BOCHKIN Igor Ivanovich), Lyudmila Chursina (see CHURSINA Lyudmila Alekseevna). Director: Yuri Belenky (see BELENKY Yuri) ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

EGOR BULYCHOV AND OTHERS (1971)- “YEGOR BULYCHOV AND OTHERS”, USSR, MOSFILM, 1971, color, 90 min. Drama. Based on the play of the same name by M. Gorky. Yegor Bulychev discovers with fear that the whole life he has lived is not his, not Bulychov’s (“I live on the wrong street!”). The revolution is approaching... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

AND OTHER OFFICIALS- ". . .AND OTHER OFFICIALS", USSR, LENFILM, 1976, color, 89 min. Office drama. The plot is based on an ordinary case from the practice of foreign trade organizations - the conclusion of a trade agreement with a foreign company. Cast: Vyacheslav Tikhonov (see... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

KING OF THE MOUNTAINS AND OTHERS- “KING OF THE MOUNTAINS AND OTHERS”, USSR, TSENTRNAUCHFILM, 1969, color, 97 min. A film about animals. The film consists of three short stories: “King of the Mountains” about a giant bear; “Loyalty” is a touching love story between two storks; “Loop” is about a proud deer. Cast: Oleg Zhakov (see... ... Encyclopedia of Cinema

October 18, 2018 in the Memorial Workshop of theater artist D.L. Borovsky - branch of GCTM named after. A.A. Bakhrushin - there was a presentation of the book “Borovsky’s Space”, written by the famous theater critic and historian of the national theater R.P. Krechetova. In her field of vision, usually only those who are called “geniuses”. She is the author of the book “Three” - about Lyubimov, Vysotsky and Borovsky; serious research about K.S. Stanislavsky, several years ago published in the series “ZhZL” and became a laureate of the “Theatrical Novel” award. About the best performances Soviet theater The 70s – 80s are told in her book “The Director and Others”. Welcoming the guests gathered in the Memorial Workshop, among whom there were many students / future theater experts and stage designers /, Deputy General Director of the State Central Theater Theater named after. A.A. Bakhrushina A.M. Rubtsov noted that this meeting continues the program of presentations and lectures organized within the framework of the II Theater Biennale and the Theater Book Festival “Theatrical Novel” and gave the floor to Rimma Pavlovna Krechetova.

“No, not a monograph...,” the author exclaims in the preface to the publication, “let it be just a collection. And there are no obligations, other than the certainty that it should be said.” I would like to quote literally every paragraph, but this is impossible. Therefore, only one: “In the most important years of growing up for the formation of a personality, when almost everyone falls under the powerful pressure of school and institute, he found himself aloof from the main pressures that rolled everyone into homogeneous pebbles. Borovsky was not "tested".

Rimma Pavlovna told how the book came together. Having written “Three” at one time, she intended to continue working on separate publications about each of the heroes. But time and circumstances intervened, and, in her opinion, the idea of ​​a story about Lyubimov and Vysotsky ceased to be relevant. As for “Borovsky Space,” this is just the beginning. We must move on. Although, according to the author, the second part will be much darker. If the first book is about accomplishments, the second will be about unrealized ones. About unstaged performances: David Lvovich dreamed of Brecht, modern French drama and much, much more. About the current theater, in the life of which he did not have the opportunity to participate. Finally, about the dream of being not a production designer, but a director. He invested his directorial talent in other people's works. About the tragic time of Taganka. And yet, he really wanted to be a teacher; his enormous teaching talent remained unclaimed. Also, according to R.P. Krechetova, in the second book it is important and interesting to talk about D.L.’s favorite people. Borovsky - predecessors and colleagues.

Art critic, member of the STD commission on scenography Anahit Oganesyan was one of the first readers of R.P.’s book. Krechetova “Borovsky’s Space”, even before its publication. She recalled the first time she met D.L. Borovsky in 1967 in Manege at the exhibition “To the 50th Anniversary of Soviet Scenography”. In the Ukraine section there were two models that amazed the imagination with their naturalness and freedom, as did the author himself standing next to him. In her opinion, the main thing in the book “Borovsky’s Space” is the flavor of the era. Rimma Pavlovna took notes for Borovsky, like Eckerman took notes for Goethe. And the combination of her documentary tape recordings with unique descriptions of performances creates an amazing effect. As you read, you feel as if you are seeing these performances. A. Oganesyan read to the guests of the presentation her enthusiastic letter to the editors of the Scene magazine, written after reading the book.

“D.L. Borovsky is an absolute example of an era where the main words were “democracy” and “modesty”. And today his work needs to be described, otherwise not everything will be clear,” he said at the presentation of the book “Borovsky’s Space” artistic director theater "Workshop P.N. Fomenko" Evgeniy Kamenkovich. This goal, in his opinion, should be served by a museum that could collect everything - everything - everything. It is remarkable that the area of ​​the Memorial Workshop has now almost tripled. Alexander Borovsky, son of David Lvovich, created a model of the future space. We can only hope that it will come true. The first head of the Memorial Workshop, D.L., also spoke about the same thing. Borovsky N.H. Ismailova. She is confident that the Memorial Workshop should turn into a large European museum - a Center for the Study of Scenography, while there is nothing like it in the world.

Galina Fadeeva

Deputy in the center general director for scientific and educational activities Alexander Rubtsov and the author of the book “The Space of David Borovsky” Rimma Krechetova
Theater expert, author of the book “The Space of David Borovsky” Rimma Krechetova

Guests at the presentation of Rimma Krechetova’s book “The Space of David Borovsky”
Guests at the presentation of Rimma Krechetova’s book “The Space of David Borovsky”
Presentation of Rimma Krechetova’s book “The Space of David Borovsky”

Photographer: Alexander Ivanishin