In any circumstances

The Stanislavsky Season festival brought theater from Abkhazia

The international theater festival “Stanislavsky Season” has been held annually in Moscow since 2006 and shows performances from Russian and foreign theaters created by directors awarded the Stanislavsky Prize.

This year the festival consisted mainly of Moscow performances, and also featured “The Idiot” by Eimuntas Nyakrosius, which Muscovites could see last year, and a new play for Moscow by the beloved Alvis Hermanis “Party in the Cemetery” (see “Vremya Novostey” from October 25) and his “Sonya,” which has been brought to the capital more than once, but no less beautiful. And also performances of the Abkhaz State Drama Theater named after. Chanba "Makhaz" and "Guarapa Clerk" directed by Valery Kove.

A graduate of the GITIS directing department, Valery Kove has been heading this theater since 1985, both as chief director and director. The son of an outstanding Abkhaz actor, he devoted himself to the Abkhaz theatrical art, giving it the style that is closest to himself. Kove prefers theatrical laconicism, the empty space of the stage, and not at all because of material difficulties, which of course exist in the Sukhumi theater, but still mainly because in this way the actor becomes the main character on stage. And “director Kove is in that happy state when skill, enthusiasm and experience are friends with each other: may God grant them to be friends in the future,” wrote a critic about him in our newspaper (see “Vremya Novostei” dated May 5, 2006) Alexander Sokolyansky.

After the play “Mahaz” was recognized as the best at the festival “East Avignon”, held in the Romanian city of Sibiu, Valery Kove admitted in an interview: “At one of the international theater festivals, where we showed the play “Mahaz”, we were called neo-modernists or neo-avant-gardists. I said that we did not intend to become either one or the other. I am sure that the theater, the director, the actor must protect themselves, on their own, without hiding behind special effects. And if the theater is alive, akin to a religious act, it will be able to captivate the viewer.”

“Makhaz” is a funny and tragic story from Fazil Iskander’s novel “Sandro from Chegem”, about a shepherd who dreamed of a son, but only daughters were born to him. “The Guarapa Clerk,” which is based on a story by the much less famous Mikhail Bgazhba, tells the story of how a traveling theater comes to a distant village, wants to perform a play, the residents don’t understand the actors, the play is disrupted, but one of the villagers finds the theater in the soul.

The theatrical performance of the Abkhaz actors also touches the soul of the audience, especially in such a festive state in which they were at the only Moscow show. The theater in Sukhumi could not exist normally for several years, there was no light in the theater, the actors did not receive salaries, men fought, performances were played on rare trips and tours. And now there is understandable excitement about participating in a prestigious Moscow festival. Moscow Abkhazians are happy to hear their native language, famous critics gathered for the performance because they heard about Valery Kove as a theater star of the North Caucasus, the author, Fazil Iskander, also came... In general, the celebration took place.

Maria ALEXEEVA