They don't get together

The Edinburg Frinj festival in Moscow ended the play “Traverse Theater” based on the play by David Graig “Damascus” the final event of the Edinburgh Frinj festival in Moscow. It would be just ridiculous to judge the heights of the British scene under the program of this festival, which was only a week and organized by the British Council in Russia and the Golden Mask. Instead of Everests, the audience simply shown several picturesque mounds, giving a small idea of the landscape of the modern British theater. From this point of view, to complete the festival “Damascus”, a strong performance-healer, was a logical step.

The main difference between the Edinburgh Frinja is its vastness, while the Edinburgh Frinj festival in Moscow, on the contrary, has clearly defined shores. No ocean, but rather a rivulet, and small, even if you wade. They showed five performances, which at different times were taken to Edinburgh to Frinj, arranged a couple of readers, several round tables and finished this. In general, an important event, no matter what side you look at. But the genre diversity is provided: first Stand -up Comedy (“Free Swimming”), then the performance created on the basis of acting sketches (“proposed circumstances”), and finally “Damascus” is a typical conversational play written by a modern Scottish playwright. And two more Russian performances, the presence of which in the program ensured relative parity with British productions. Moreover, both the “school for fools” by Andrei Mogeliy, and “Russian longing” by Yuri Pogrebniko in different years returned from “Frinja” with victories.

Damascus was shown in Edinburgh last summer and was successful. It’s not that he became a festival hit, but in the upper part of the rating lists, without which Frinja would be completely unthinkable, this performance fell. Why not? Good actors with a minimum of directing play a shallow play - this is very British. Still, England, as well as Scotland, still appreciates more in the playwright theater than a director.

Any review of performances of this kind will somehow reduce to retelling the plot. Damascus was written about a young awkward Scottish commander who arrives in Syria in order to poke a new English textbook and, of course, is immediately involved in the cultural dialogue between the East and the West. It instantly turns out that nothing has changed since Kipling: the East and the West together still do not come down. Moreover, even in such innocent things as the study of Past Perfect Continuous. To understand this, you can not leave the hall of the Damasian hotel at all, where the play takes place. The main character, the Scot of the floor, is moderately absurd and funny. He, as a person, for a while knocked out of a familiar civilizational track, now and then in amazement has to open his mouth, faced with an unknown culture. On the side of the scene, a sophisticated pianist Elena was attached, who does not get into action at all, but simply entertains the hotel guests with various music, and the audience with entertaining psychological comments. Apparently, the very profession of a hotel pianist has this - which you will not see, alternating on the keys of Chopin with unobtrusive poppy. David Graig’s play cannot be called especially wise or too original, but here you can sometimes entertain yourself with observations of people with such different planets as Damascus and Edinburgh.

06/06/2008 / Gleb Sitkovsky material published in the newspaper No. 104 dated 06.06.2008.