The sexual revolution of the 90s

Elena Hang, a journalist and TV presenter, lived in America since 1989, and in the late 90s she received a proposal from Leonid Parfenov-to conduct the first program in Russia about sex in its various manifestations. “About this” has become one of the most rated programs on Russian television: some hated it and called it a seedling of immorality, others saw in it a source of sexual education and the solution of many problems. Elena Hang - about “about this”: how it all began and what it came to.

-In your book “About everything”, you describe in detail how Parfenov persuaded you to become the host of the “About this” program, how you, living in America then, did not know who was calling you, and made inquiries about him, how he suddenly came to you and still persuaded. How did he then set you the task, how did he formulate, what should this program be about?

- He said that now there are a lot of books about sex, many films, a bunch of pornography, the people are saturated with all this - but there is no normal program where you could calmly, intelligently, without vulgarity to talk about problems related to sex. That is, on the one hand, there is access to information, and on the other hand, people are completely ignorant - loneliness in the crowd. Lenya said: yesterday it was early, tomorrow it will be too late, we must now take power. Revolutionary time. And since this niche was absolutely free, he said that the program was doomed to success. But then Lenya quickly disowned her - he was wildly annoyed that everyone was only asking about her, he said: it feels like I did nothing before this program. At his request, his name was removed from the credits. And he was the author of the idea.

- How was the work built? Have you participated in inventing topics?

- No, the editors did it, but I did not participate in the development of topics and the search for heroes - I had a crazy schedule: I flew to Moscow on the eve of the filming - the Delta plane at 11 in the morning. The day was prepared, and the next was the shooting. We shot programs for three days, and then I flew to America. And so she dangled between the two countries.

But there was one thing that I came up with for the program - and it was the most difficult, I insisted on that. You understand, it was difficult for me to just declare: today our topic is an orgasm, let's say. It sounded very much. In general, I was from the Soviet past, I was wildly tagged to take it and say: an orgasm. And I thought for a long time how to do it not so shocking. In general, I was the most conservative from the whole team, they pushed me, opened the horizons, and I dragged my legs behind them. We had no guidelines, no one indicated anything to us, so my self -censorship worked. And I decided that we will start every topic with a joke. Because when a person laughs, the situation is discharged and further easier. Here is an example of what my life easier for me. The old man caught a goldfish. She tells him: let me go, I will fulfill any of your desires. He says: you know, I am very worried about the Arab-Israeli conflict, it is please. The fish says: don’t, listen, it is to convene the UN Security Council, pay negotiations, America connects here, it’s hard, let's get something else. The fisherman says: Yes? Well, you know, here I have been living with my old woman thirty years and three years, and we have never had oral sex. Can I somehow organize it? The fish thought and says: what did you say about the Arab-Israeli conflict there? Dear friends, the theme of our program today is a fisherman’s unrealistic dream, oral sex. And everyone is already laughing, and then the conversation flows easily.

But it was painful: to look for a suitable joke on each topic. And so we sat until night: until we come up with - we will not leave. And they tried to humanize this topic, with which I was generally very poorly familiar. Very often, when my face stretched after some confessions, the program editor Andrei Loshak shouted to my ear: “Lena! After all, I gave you to read the “Kamasutra”, you seem to have fallen asleep again on the fourth page! I asked to read three chapters and prepare for the program. ”

“Do you remember how the first gear was taking place?”

- I won’t tell you about the first, I can’t. There, the situation clearly escaped from control, and some things were happening that I could not even tell. I only remember that I watched where the way out of the studio was, and I thought: now I will go out, as if to the toilet, and I would never return. And I even moved-and then I have a chief editor to the headphone: stand!

- What was it?

- I can't. Everything was seriously there, everything is real. And for me it was such a horror - what I saw ... I can tell another story. We have already been spinning, and we had the second season-the editors were cool, worked well. Well, everyone already knew the program well, and these girls walked along the Ostankino very proud - of course, the boys tried to get acquainted with them, but they did not reciprocate. And now we plan a program about sadomasochism. The heroine of the program comes, a sadist, in latex, with a whip, normal, very interesting. I say: where is the masochist? They say to me: an ambush with a masochist. What's happened? You see, they, as a rule, are all very wealthy people, bankers, lawyers (it’s clear why) - they never want to act. The heroine says: well, do not be a masochist, I will tell you everything myself. I say: well, no, it is not good, everything is honest with us. I tell girls-editors: this is your puncture-either you find masochists in two hours, or there will be no program. And then I tell you what I found out only after a few years. The girls went to the cafe on the ground floor of Ostankino, and at the entrance there are guards who winked at them for a long time, but the girls did not condescend to them. And then they look at these two guards-guards and say: do not want to drink coffee with us? Those are completely delighted: they drew the attention of the goddesses - and went to drink coffee with these hooligans. The girls drove them - so that the guys did not knit a bast at all. "Want to act in the program?" - "We want!" “Well, let's go, just quietly.” They changed them into the masochists. This means that they are in latex, but with a neckline on the pope - to whip it conveniently. The faces are closed, the collar. And they led them to the studio. And towards the head of the Ostankino security: O Lord, he says, we must close this program to hell, disgusted, they drive some kind of freaks in tights! And these to him: Ivan Petrovich, so it's me, Kolyan! And the one: Chur me!

Very often, when my face stretched after some confessions, the program editor Andrei Loshak shouted to my ear: “Lena! After all, I gave you to read the “Kamasutra”, you seem to have fallen asleep again on the fourth page! I asked to read three chapters and prepare for the program. ”

Then I did not know this, they only told me after a few years. I understood that much more happened there than they told me - a lot of things were happening. But, you know, we had such a friendly team - I think I was happy then. Because we walked in white snow, where no one walked. There was no path. We walked through intuition, we did not understand where the vulgarity began, where the perversion. There was a program about pedophilia, but this is okay. But there was about those who are with the dead ... I say: this is a perversion. And they say to me: but this is related to sex? - It has. - Does it exist? - Yes. - So, we must talk about it. We have the right. And, as my teacher Yegor Yakovlev said, the editor -in -chief of Moscow News, there is no bad news, there is poor performance. And I was wildly tormented - for example, they shot a program about sex and art, Kulik ran on four paws, began to scream, bite and bark, I was horrified because he was almost naked, and they say to me: if you don’t understand art, try, read, understand. And it was all so incomprehensible that I asked Anna Vladimirovna Dmitrieva (this is my coach and an idol) - how to understand where the line is. She watched all the issues of the program, only said that she could not watch them with me, she went to another room. But she supported me.

- There is a feeling that it was supposed to be a program about sex, but it turned out quite quickly that, among other things, an acute social station was obtained, sometimes almost unrelated with sex ...

- Yes, I give two examples all the time that shocked me. And I believe that we had to give the order for them, but we, on the contrary, were reproached, tried to close - the Duma raised the question for consideration. They said that this was a corrugated gear - and they did not see the fact that it was an acute social. They brought a girl from the Pavlovo-Posad district. And the topic was - sex until adulthood. She is a minor, and she had more than 50 partners. Such a girl is sitting, there is nothing particularly sexy in her. And she says: yes, there was already so much. All: Oh, what a nightmare. And I understand that she has pain. And I told her: "Did you like all these men?" -"No, well, somehow usually." But it turned out that Moscow officials came there for forty - exactly for these little girls. I say: "What does your mother say?" “Well, my mother drank, always lay.” - "And dad?" - “And dad is obdated. They all told me: what are you sitting at home, go do something. And the brother fights. We all watched the cinema. And these came - they could pour beer just like that. And all sorts of good words said. Therefore, I have a very warm feeling for them. And if they returned, I would go again. ” And I tell me the editors in the "ear": Lena, ask her a question about her father. And there was a story that my father was sleeping with her. And she had to be squeezed. And I understand that if I ask her this question, she will burst into tears. They say to me: ask a question! And if I asked, it would be a bomb, ratings. But I did not. I wanted to show how our officials talk about teenage illegibility, and then they themselves go to shoot little girls. And about the father is a completely different story. And I did not ask. We were very scolded for this program, because it corrupts and denigrates our youth.

And the second story is sex and disabled. The Komsomolskaya Pravda wiped my legs about us. The transmission was such that all people have the right to happiness. The editors performed a miracle: they found a couple, both cerebral palsy, and they loved each other very much. Parents forbade them to meet, and they saw each other once a year, say, when they were placed in some kind of sanatorium there. They themselves could not walk. And when they fell in love, they bribed, bossed the nanny so that she would bring them to some kind of washing and put them in the bathroom. And there they lay, hugged. And now the editors brought her, brought him - secretly from each other, placed in different dressing rooms. And they invite the girl to the studio first. She comes out, they say to me: Len, only very carefully, you hold your face, do not scare. She appears - and I have horror, because I realized that she could not say anything - she shakes her so. And the audience are already spoiled and want to tin. I ask her: "What is your name?" - But she can’t answer anything - she already says badly, and here Sofites, spectators, she is also worried. And suddenly the audience begins to cheer her up: you don’t worry, we are in no hurry, do not hurry, you tell me everything ... And the first hour she got used to it, then came to her senses and talked about her great love, as she dreamed about the prince, as she came to this sanatorium and saw him - and he was so beautiful. And she wrote poetry to him - read, well, Pushkin is simple. Then he says: here you, Lena, think that you have sex very well. And our sex and orgasm are much stronger than yours. Because the nannies will put us nearby, we will take each other's hand - and this is such an orgasm. Well, after that I say: we have a surprise for you - and they take out a young man in a stroller. And they are so happy, everyone sobs in the hall. I thought it was a triumph. That everyone will understand how happy they are and how ashamed we are to complain about something. But the next day, the Komsomolskaya Pravda comes out with the heading "Hanga does not shun anything!"

- In general, “about this” about many problems spoke the first or one of the first. What other “social” programs are you recalling?

- We were the first to talk about violence at work. Nobody spoke about this before us - and still do not really say. And the mother of the same girl came to us and said that her daughter refused to sleep with her boss when he began to upheld her. And this mother says: tell me mercy, she does not want to sleep with the boss! What a fifa! Does she know what I went to when it was necessary to feed her little? I did this that I can’t tell you. Raised my daughter!

The program I am proud of is a sexual education at school. I invited my primary school teacher to the studio, Elena Semenovna Zilberman. She was told at school that if she goes to this program, she would be kicked out. And she still came - "I have to support my student." And she said that the idea of ​​talking about sex at school is correct, only the performance with us, as always, is monstrous. Who conducted such lessons? The one who has a free hour. Physical education teacher says: do you have a window now? Do you have children? Are you talking about? Well, go tell me.

But the next day, the Komsomolskaya Pravda comes out with the heading "Hanga does not shun anything!"

We were one of the first to talk about AIDS. The Americans and ABC arrived to make a AIDS program, and their correspondent came to us on a record. There was a young man who said that he would never be protected, because - I quote - "having sex in a condom is like sniffing a rose in a gas mask." And this American, thinking that he will tear this little girl now, asks: tell me, please, did you ever know how people from AIDS die? He answers: my friend died a few days ago. And what? Well, now, do not have sex? It became clear that we are in some completely different planes. The boy is in the figure, Russian roulette.

But at least we started talking about AIDS, no one talked about it, and the numbers are still silent.

- You had real, not decoy, heroes and real public. That is, before you go out onto the screen and encounter the reaction of a large audience, you tested all the topics in the studio. How did you work with the public, what was difficult?

- I generally consider them co -hosts. At first, I could not utter words there in general from horror. Then - you force yourself to say "having sex." But you cannot say this in every phrase, you need to somehow diversify the speech. And so I am stuck - and they begin to tell me from different sides: do not worry, say “possess”, “love” - they so wanted this program, they felt that if they behave tactlessly, they would destroy all the magic. We recorded each program for three hours. The first one and a half hours all went nowhere, nothing happened. And only when everyone was already tired, then a real record began. We wrote three programs a day. And now, I remember, there was wild heat, and one woman from the upper tier fainted. Everyone ran up, I was scared that she broke, and she woke up, opened her eyes and said: I have to return upstairs, otherwise my place would take my place. It was amazing, the topic was a female orgasm. And she climbed back, watched everything.

- It is clear that it was not easy for you. Was there a moment when you felt the switch that the voltage was removed?

- It was not. Every time it was a shock. Each time, the editors came and said: there will be such and such a topic, I grabbed the heart-what are you going crazy? And they told me: “Lena! We will tell you now! " They took me for the old pistor, a hat, who does not know how. In general, it was their program, Angela Boskis, Andrei Loshak, other wonderful editors: they enjoyed, they were looking for freaks at nightclubs, dressed up, arranged a show, imagined someone-only to lure and “rivet” their favorite word. This program was their brainchild, and I, I think, annoyed them, because they have wings - and I come and slow down the process: oh, no, I can’t. "Lena! Believe me, you do not know anything in your Puritan America, Russia has long been ahead of it! ”

- How did you cope with the emotional load?

- It was very easy for me to switch. We shot for three days, I got on the plane and flew to America, where no one knew me. I studied at NYU and lied that I was giving up for some business that I was a poor student, I blew myself some kind of grants. And then the New York Times publishes a huge article about “about this” with my portrait-and I am also in a wig! "The most popular show in Russia." Or not, somehow they wrote this way: there are only two black people who have done a lot for the Russians-Pushkin for the soul and here is the Hang for ... I see. And all! This number fell into the hands of the Nyu rector. He called me. I did not know for what reason, some kind of modest handkerchief was put on and went for something like that, and he snapped this number on the table and says: are you kidding me? But then he laughed and says: I will read this program to you as a practice. Because it is all psychotherapy.

Every time it was a shock. Each time, the editors came and said: there will be such and such a topic, I grabbed the heart-what are you going crazy? And they told me: “Lena! We will tell you now! " They took me for the old pistor, a hat, who does not know how.

- Was there a moment when you felt that the program has exhausted itself?

- We broke the ridge for ourselves. At some point, when we were already very popular, we decided to go to increase. We have already shown everything, told about orgasm - also, in my opinion, a social program about female orgasms. We were the first to invite gays on the air - and the teenagers looked and thought: I am not alone. Потому что пойти-то не к кому, родители убьют, друзья засмеют. Тут мы тоже важную социальную функцию выполнили.

Так вот — где мы сломались. Мы хотели идти на повышение. Мы поехали на слет садомазохистов в Голландию. Огромный ангар, куда съезжаются со всего мира участники. Андрей туда вошел, вышел и сказал: «Лена, вам туда нельзя. Подводки запишите тут у входа, а внутрь не заходите. Вам будет плохо». Он пошел туда, они все сняли — а я потом это смотреть не могла, сидела, закрывая глаза, — там и кровь, и прочие ужасы. Говорят, что в день показа Москва просто замерла.

— Это какой год?

— 98-й, наверное. Москва была в шоке. Они такого не видели. А на следующей неделе уже надо было идти выше. Ты уже не можешь про душу и любовь-морковь. И мы решаемся ехать в Израиль и снимать там сексуальную жизнь. Ну ладно, сняли там проститутку русскую. Но потом стали снимать обрезание. Это было ужасно, потому что мы пошли не туда.

А потом это смотреть не могла, сидела, закрывая глаза, — там и кровь, и прочие ужасы. Говорят, что в день показа Москва просто замерла.

— Почему обрезание вдруг — это же не сексуальная практика?

— Ну вот я говорю: мы пошли не туда. В то время как надо было идти вглубь, в душу. А когда ты играешь на повышение — это лобовой ход. Программа закрылась не поэтому формально — там были финансовые соображения. Но по сути мы себе задали неверное направление, мы загнали себя в тупик. Надо было делать: секс и спорт — не все знают, что гимнасткам запрещают заниматься сексом, а за волейболистками, наоборот, возят табун мужиков, а некоторых фигуристок заставляли беременеть, выступать на ранних сроках, а потом делать аборт. Дальше — секс и политика, это песня! Секс и бизнес, секс и разведка. Такие могли быть передачи — но мы пошли по наиболее простому пути.

Я думаю, что это была самая яркая страница в моей жизни — и жалко, что она закончилась. Не было ни одной скучной передачи у нас. И не было другой такой передачи с тех пор.