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Should children pay for the sins of their parents? How to comprehend the will of God? Where does injustice come from in the world - and how to come to terms with its existence? Sasha Denisova is not afraid of damn questions and loud words. A year and a half ago, in the “Wandering in the Ten Commandments” (the play “Decalogue” on the stage of the branch of the Mayakovsky Theater), she began to explore the modern sound of the gospel words. In the premiere of the Moscow Art Theater. Chekhov Denisova turned to the Old Testament parable of Job.

Acting not only in the usual capacity of an author-playwright, but also as a director, she indulges in unbridled experimentation. Which often leads to internal contradictions. Thus, “Job” follows the newfangled tradition of documentary, drawing the ancient plot into the orbit of everyday life. Shortly before the lights go out in the hall, the main character Ilya Savin (Alexei Krasnenkov) addresses the audience with an apology: “Mom is calling... We must answer!” The beginning of the telephone conversation that follows (“I got there okay, although the road is bad”; “there are a lot of people here”) makes you suspect for a minute that someone from the audience has wandered onto the stage. This non-random doubt is soon resolved, but the signal has been given, and we almost automatically tune in to the wave of verisimilitude, Novo-Drama realism. Which in “Job” is paradoxically combined with convention. The latter is manifested in the most striking discovery of Denisova the director, which determined the appearance of the performance. The action takes place in the laconic settings of the Savin’s house with school boards instead of walls. In them, the gifted autistic teenager Tabitha (Daria Makarova) counts down the days Ilya spent in her family (seven, like the days of creation), simultaneously building a bridge from the production to the text. In essence, the girl transfers the author's stage directions into the theatrical space and structures the performance according to literary canons. Inscriptions and drawings on the boards replace the overgrown tree outside the window, dried bream hanging on its branches, and an uprooted stump. But most importantly, they crowd out actions: if Boris Savin (Igor Khripunov) is drooling from his mouth, just write about it. If Tabitha wipes her father’s mouth, she simply erases the inscription from the board.

Like convention and documentary, minimalism and excess coexist in the performance. As mentioned above, the scenery of “Job” is extremely simple. At the same time, in an hour and a half, the actors manage to demonstrate a frightening variety of skills: they read poetry in non-existent languages, dance, utter philosophical maxims, sing songs by V. Tsoi, Zh. Aguzarova, B. Grebenshchikov. The wealth of expressive means, alas, borders on confusion; Moreover, half of the performers sing frankly poorly, and when they approach the microphone, the audience shudders. Changes in emotional tension, the discrepancy between the scale of the task and the eclecticism of the result are also noticeable in the text of the play. The story of an adult son who came to present belated scores to his father who had abandoned his family and instead of finding the owner of his life, found an old man with Alzheimer’s, can be read literally and unambiguously. As a story about people in grief, as a call to help your neighbor, and not indulge in abstract thoughts. Ilya poured out his soul in letters to his father for decades, but Boris’s adopted daughter Maria (Yana Gladkikh) answered them. Tabitha, Maria and their mother Lydia Semyonovna (Olga Lapshina) have been waiting for years for a sign from Boris, evidence that the disease has not been overcome by the brilliant brain. However, it was not he who gave the signs, but Tabitha. Three lonely women were waiting for change, but their prayers were heard not by higher powers, but only by Ilya. He heard - and fulfilled, helped, himself revived and saved by new relatives. The idea, emphasized in the finale by Tsoi’s song, is as old as time: we ourselves are the architects of our own happiness. And at the same time, the happiness of others.

However, Sasha Denisova’s play also allows for a metaphorical reading. Tabitha is the embodiment of boundless faith (“Dad is healthy!”). Mary is doubt personified. Lydia Semyonovna is a religion in which humility and worldly wisdom are combined with formalism, even hypocrisy. Elijah is the man from Michelangelo's fresco. Stretching out hands to God; desperately and furiously making claims against Him; endlessly puzzling over His will; stubbornly proving his independence, but living in anticipation of God's Word. Boris Savin - God. That is, in the universe of Sasha Denisova, a brilliant mathematician who created the world as an equation, as a computer program calculated to the smallest detail. And then he left his creation. We ask for revelations and miracles, we demand to reason with us, to forgive our sins, to correct mistakes, to explain, to “look after”... But, adding an element of chance to the formula of being, the deity left his creatures to deal with the results on their own.

The Creator does not give preference to anyone (“Under the whole sky, everything is mine!”), He does not promise salvation to anyone. We ourselves make signs and answer questions. Once we admit this, dare to make decisions, we will see what we were afraid to believe: God is dead. How Boris dies when Ilya dares to decide the fate of his family: he marries Maria, enrolls Tabitha in a school for gifted children, rents an apartment for Lydia in Moscow.

Instead of wasting time on pointless thoughts and rantings, look around. A humane call, necessary in an era of mutual alienation. Only the biblical “Job” is about a conversation with God, and not with a person. About the origins of evil, about the irreparable error in the majestic temple of the universe, and not about the whirlwind of small grievances and big deeds. The Old Testament text sets different scales, requires different depths and heights. Which Sasha Denisova’s play, alas, does not achieve. The playwright and director set herself a very difficult task. What commands respect. But it does not rule out disappointment. It is impossible to answer the centuries-old, sometimes vitally important question: “Why is the creation of the All-Good God imperfect? How to come to terms with the all-pervasive power of evil? - throw out the banal: “There is an accident in the world.” It is unthinkable and unacceptable to respond to the Gospel: “My God! Why have you forsaken me? - advise to contact another interlocutor. Denisova lowers the bar, which leads to an involuntary substitution of concepts. And to the flattening and fading of the production. Of course, it is difficult to expect a new word from a young playwright in a philosophical and religious debate that has been going on for centuries. Its task, obviously, is not to build new worldview schemes, attempts to open humanity’s eyes to the truth, etc., but to understand. The ability to talk about eternal pain in the jargon of the younger generation, to discern biblical drama in the bustle of our everyday lives.

Sasha Denisova already succeeded in doing this once - and she succeeded brilliantly! Her Decalogue does not complement or reinterpret the Ten Commandments. He makes you see their fulfillment or violation in banal events and the most empty minutes of your own life. See it and shudder. Notice - and begin to read everyday life through the magnifying glass of eternity. The “Decalogue” is memorable and captivating precisely because of this ability to raise everyday life to the heights of existence. On the contrary, “Job” - despite the important theme, original directorial techniques, living language - is puzzling and disappointing with the replacement of metaphysical search with the advice of a psychoanalyst, the uncontrollable fall of being into everyday life.