Translated material
Odnokorytniki
Hamlet, Claudius and Polonius turned out to be peers on the stage of the Moscow Art Theater
Long before the premiere, it became known that Hamlet would be played at the Art Theater by St. Petersburg actor Mikhail Trukhin, and the choice of director Yuri Butusov did not surprise anyone. The most delicious role in the world went to the thirty-four-year-old artist not only because of his abilities (which are undoubted), but also because of his acquaintances. Let us emphasize that there is nothing wrong with this: by offering the role to his old friend, Butusov acted correctly and naturally. He did not need the abstract “best”, but precisely “his own”, painfully familiar Hamlet. The director knows the actor Trukhin - his Vladimir in Godot, his wonderful Woyzeck - like a flaky man, and this feeling of “flaking” (openness, vulnerability, inflammation of exposed nerves) became the starting point when working on the role.It was also very relevant that Trukhin’s fellow students (LGITMiK class of 1996) Konstantin Khabensky and Mikhail Porechenkov joined the Moscow Art Theater troupe in 2003. Butusov appointed them to the roles of Claudius and Polonius, and the idea of “acquaintance” began to take on distinct plot outlines. Do Claudius and Hamlet know each other well - yes, it hurts. “Like a fever / It bubbles up in my blood,” says Claudius-Khabensky, and he really is shaking with a fever.
In Butusov's play, the mutual hatred of Hamlet and Claudius is the hatred of equal and in many ways similar people. Both are cocky and springy, both love tricks and traps (“What a commotion, / When a catch meets a catch!”), but, having lost their temper, they easily get into a fight: the courtiers have to pull them apart. They also have the same sense of humor. The foolish Hamlet pours wine on Claudius; he, remembering his royal dignity, hands him a bowl of whipped cream: smear it on your face. Probably the jester Yorick (remember how the First Gravedigger certifies him) was their common favorite.
The director's own humor is more subtle. Gertrude (Marina Golub) brings Claudia a long-skirted royal uniform; he, having put it on, puts a wire hanger to his head: it looks like a Napoleonic cocked hat. The performance of “The Mousetrap” (Actor - Sergei Sosnovsky, also known as the Spirit of the Father; Actress - Maria Zorina) at first turns into an erotic show: thanks to Zorina, it’s not even bad. Hamlet-Trukhin screams his last words, “Then is silence,” with inhuman heartlessness; and shortly before that, he yelled at Laertes (Roman Grechishkin): “Did you think of taking it by the throat? I can do it too!!!” Etc. If such things do not amuse you, then the simple-minded efforts of Mikhail Porechenkov, recklessly making a show of the whole performance, will definitely go in vain - and this will only make it worse for you, and not for him, who is completely satisfied with himself.
Butusov is a very inventive director, however, he is used to thinking through only the immediate consequences of his working guesses: two or three moves, no more. Therefore, in his performances there is always a share of approximate and forced decisions, staged mistakes. In Hamlet it is quite high.
I’m not talking about concepts, not about whether it makes sense to bring Hamlet closer to Claudius in Butusov’s way, whether this does not reduce the scale of the tragic personality: reduces - so reduces, there is nothing to do. It is characteristic of Butusov to reduce the intensity of the tragedy; we saw this in both “Godot” and “Richard III”. One can, citing Hesse, say that Hamlet has one more dimension than the world around him needs, that if we lose sight of this dimension, the whole meaning of Shakespeare’s play is canceled - but this is all talk on top of the performance, we must talk about it flesh. About the fact that, from the very beginning, pumping Hamlet-Trukhin with adrenaline, the director greatly impoverishes him. This Hamlet has enough strength and time to be horrified, to grieve, to come up with intrigues, to poison his soul - the only thing he never has time to do is think, and the ability to think, in fact, distinguishes a tragic hero from a melodramatic one. The fiery Trukhin categorically fails to cope with the monologue “To be or not to be,” the director has to come up with a cover, and we see how Hamlet solves the problems of earthly and afterlife existence, while simultaneously moving a heavy metal table. Then this table needs to be played, whether you like it or not, somehow, Claudius takes up the task of fiddling with it - so a half-thought-out decision gives rise to a chain of increasingly obvious inconsistencies and flaws.
It is clear why Gertrude in Butusov’s play is played by Marina Golub - vigorous, loud-mouthed, sensual - a very interesting actress in her own way (as a stylistic reference, let us remember not the constantly intertwined women of Rubens, but Katka from Blok’s “The Twelve”). The director knows a lot about using rough texture: of course, such a Gertrude should have coveted Claudius, who was fit to be her son; Of course, Claudius, remembering her in his repentant monologue “I have with me everything why I killed: / My crown, land and queen,” shudders slightly before the word “queen.” Gertrude-Golub is very good in her conversation with Polonius (beginning of Act II), in the scenes with Rosencrantz and Guildenstern (Oleg Topolyansky and Alexey Agapov). However, she fails to have a decisive explanation with Hamlet at the end of Act III, no matter how hard she tries to turn her vigor into majesty. However, when she stops trying, it turns out even worse: I have never heard the cry “Have mercy!” so reminiscent of the scolding “Bastard!”
When staging Hamlet, Butusov came up with one expressive thing from the very beginning. From the list of characters he excludes not only Voltimand, whom everyone crosses out, and Fortinbras, whom many do without, but also absolutely necessary characters: for example, Horatio. How can you do without it? The bewilderment, however, immediately dissipates.
In the people patrolling Elsinore, the public easily recognizes Khabensky, Trukhin and Porechenkov. However, now we are not facing Claudius, Hamlet and Polonius, but the nameless characters of the Prologue (in the text - Bernardo, Horatio, Marcellus). An Actor and an Actress will work for Fortinbras's army, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern will work for the gravediggers, Polonius will work for the sailor bringing the news of Hamlet's return to Elsinore (the completely naughty Porechenkov came up with an incredible mixture of stuttering and a lisp). Why it was done this way, you can guess: in the list of characters, in addition to the actors, only those who die in the plot remained. Having understood this, you can give free rein to your imagination: the action takes place in the kingdom of the dead or, conversely, the immortals (in both cases, many metaphorical interpretations can be created on the scenery of Alexander Shishkin in full swing); the characters are not so much living people as astral bodies (which will explain any dubious places in the acting), etc. Previously, such fantasies aroused interest, now they cause yawning. The only thing that needs to be said is that among all the acting transformations there is one (the first) expressive one and, perhaps, a couple more meaningful ones. Everything else is justified only by simple internal theatrical considerations: which actor now, of his own free will, would want to play the Second Grave Digger. For the sake of human interests, Butusov does not hesitate to violate the interests of artistic logic; If she herself were stronger, the director’s philanthropy could be considered a virtue.