Seagulls are not a toy for children

The festival “Personal Business” has opened

On the backdrop screen, a computer-created seagull with a white, dense, palpably plastic body flaps its wings and flies towards the viewer. In the second half of the performance, only her skeleton flies in the same way. (However, I have never seen the skeleton of a seagull - neither in reality nor on the screen; it may well be that the structure diagram of some long-extinct lizard was used - the skull is too elongated and the jaws are somehow threatening.) Performance by Sasha Pepelyaev , which opened the summer festival of dance theaters “Personal Business”, is called “alpha-Chaika”; The choreographer, who had previously often based his works on Oberiuts, decided to stretch out Chekhov’s play in his hands.

“Personal Affair” is a new project of the association of dance theaters “Tsekh”. It’s like a small stage of the festival that separated from the annual December festival “Tsekha” and went on its own to walk around the city. A stage designed for solos and duets, for small but entertaining performances. Even more experimental than the experimentally followed “Workshop” itself; in general, it is certainly a spectacle for those who already know what modern dance is, and those who are curious about where it can unfold in the future. The main program of “Personal Business” (work of Americans, Dutch and our people from Kostroma and Chelyabinsk) will take place in the “Assembly Hall” (“Project_Fabrika” on Baumanskaya) from this Thursday to Sunday. It is interesting that the “alpha Seagull” of the head of the “Workshop” Pepelyaev, who opened the fest, obviously does not coincide with the declared genre of “chamber experiments”.

No improvisational liberties, strictly structured direction. From the “basement joys” there is only a declaration of common work and common responsibility: the choreography is assigned to the entire theater (it is now called Apparatus instead of “Kinetics”, which has become familiar over the last ten years), and the names of the performers are given in a list, without distribution by role. Everything else - from the quality of movement to the quality of design (in the program: “the costumes are casual, the scenery is conventional”, obvious coquetry) is the excellent work of accomplished professionals.

Pepelyaev does not retell Chekhov’s play, he selects the key, “sick”, most echoing points in it and imagines how it could be. What Arkadina might be like - a small woman in black, limping as if every bone and every muscle hurts (this is how old ballerinas sometimes walk; however, the vast majority of them are excellent at hiding physical pain). Having just moved clumsily, she suddenly throws out a fouette into the text - with the rigidity and freedom of a professional ballerina (let’s break the principle of theater and name a name: Tatyana Gordeeva, who at one time graduated from MAHA with honors, and then rushed after Pepelyaev in search of new dance territories). What could Nina Zarechnaya be like - a long girl with a very short haircut and dyed her head blue in a baggy T-shirt, a kind of flower child, a visitor to Eastern philosophical seminars (Olga Tsvetkova, in whose plastic the air of Amsterdam is in some unknown way combined with the efficiency of a New York treadmill) . And how Treplev can try to communicate with Nina using the classic communication tube, which once appeared in the film “Assa” - only the tube will be flexible, and Nina will get confused and stuck in it, nothing good will come of it. And how Treplev will split into two - into an adult guy and into a boy of about ten years old, and they will divide the line (the boy will begin “My mother ...”, the adult will continue “... a psychological curiosity”; the move is obvious, but no less accurate ; and when Zarechnaya, already betraying him, tells Treplev that “there must be love in the play,” the adult will freeze, the boy will slap her in the face).

There are important things in the play, and there are equally important jokes - Nina always wears a T-shirt with the inscription “My Life”; when Trigorin reads the phrase “If you want my life, come and take it,” the T-shirt is removed and given to Trigorin. Of course, there are no details - no trip to Yelets with merchants in third class, no mass of minor characters. There is actually no break in time - the performance, although it runs for almost two hours, goes on without an intermission, and everything in this estate happens in a row - without absences to Moscow. This company of people doesn’t need Moscow, they don’t need additional time to work on Chekhov’s characters - with Pepelyaev the situation is already set, nothing changes. Here are the conditions of the problem - and here is the solution, twice two makes four.

This conclusion, this scene of Kostya's suicide, is done best of all. Arkadina and Masha (desperately, restrainedly, incredibly played by Anna Abalikhina) play lotto on the proscenium. They speak English - and, listening to the text, you realize with amazement that this is some kind of obvious soundtrack of a porn film with the corresponding terms, smacking, etc. For this one scene, a monument should be erected to Pepelyaev - because none of the directors has ever turned out Kostya’s disgust so much. For him, all these lotto games are monstrous porn; this is his view. And Treplev, huddled in the far corner, pulls a black bag over his head and with a sharp movement sprays a little red paint on his temple...

Actually, it should have ended here. But Pepelyaev either doesn’t know how to stage spectacular finales, or is embarrassed by them, or doesn’t trust the audience - will everyone understand? And again the boy comes out and diligently reads “To be or not to be.” And Trigorin launches a toy seagull monster on the floor, and it moves its paws and walks across the stage for a long, long time. In one of the previous scenes, a skeleton flying on the screen opened its mouth and seemed to swallow a broadcast camera - we were given a tour through the digestive system of a bird (everything is neat and cartoonish). Dead art ate Treplev? Well, one consolation: he won’t succeed with Pepelyaev.

Anna GORDEEVA