Two Raikin

Konstantin Raikin became famous in the Soviet cinema of the buffalonal role of Truffaldino - a comical rogue who managed to serve two enlightened aristocrats at once. Perhaps this role from the era of Raikin’s youth, when he was not yet, was the son of the same, the real Raikin - an amazing illustration of how the mask can be suitable for the lyceum, to be, as they say, fit. Because the whole creative (and personal) biography of Konstantin Raikin is the biography of Truffaldino. It’s just that in the light of the scandal with a breakdown of the concert in Odessa, and even against the backdrop of the next skirmish of Konstantin Arkadyevich with another outstanding figure of Russian culture, Vladimir Medinsky, this property of character became obvious even for those who had never particularly followed Raikin. Well, it is impossible to serve two gentlemen at the same time!

The most interesting thing in the Odessa concert is not even in the very fact of the scandal, not even in Raikin’s flight from the stage after the sacramental question “whose Crimea?”, But simply in conducting Ukrainian tour. Raikin arrived not only in Odessa, but also in Kyiv and in the Dnieper. In the last two cities, concerts went without excesses not from a special love for Raikin, but because a kind of Moscow culture with its poetic evenings and willingness to read old poems to call for the answer of new tyrants, it has long become an alien for the inhabitants of these Ukrainian cities. Raikin's performances were rather a marginal, little interesting event - and therefore no one was interested in the head of Satyricon, whose Crimea is still. But in Odessa, the attraction of Moscow celebrities is still great, many inhabitants of the port city live his fictional past, which Odessa knows how and loves to export. Raikin is not a stranger here, and therefore his arrival could not go unnoticed. Precisely because in Odessa, the stars reacted with much more attention to the arrival of the visiting, here they thwarted the concert.

But why does Raikin generally come to Ukraine, although he does not perceive this country with all its problems seriously? Indeed, in his sensational interview, which suddenly appeared on the network exactly before Ukrainian concerts, it is not only about that part of the artist who rejoiced the occupation of Crimea. And also about the fright that Raikin experienced, having learned that Russia will not be - attention, will not - intervene in Ukrainian affairs and will leave the fate of the “Russian people” in Ukraine and the Russian city of Sevastopol. That is, fear left Konstantin Arkadyevich only when it turned out that Putin was lying that Russia was ready to intervene and protect both Russian people and the Russian city. A clear and honest position, expressed in the textbook appeal "Putin, enter the troops!" But why then, after the appearance of these troops, come with tour? Only because of greed, because of the desire to earn extra fee?

Don't think. The main thing is still the nature of Truffaldino. Kalyagin, Tabakov and other crafty courtiers of the Soviet theater and cinema, who have long changed their own honor, but never changed the authorities, and will not think of going to Kyiv or Odessa. They serve one master - to the one who is currently in the Kremlin. They serve not for fear, but for provision. For theaters, rewards, for permission to front when the opportunity is given. And Raikin wants to serve two gentlemen. He wants to show what can speak both in Kyiv and in Moscow - and not offend anyone, everyone is pleasant. If it were not for his proverb in an interview with provincial journalists, if he had not said what he really was thinking, he would have succeeded. He would never answer the question "whose Crimea?" And he would not sign a single collective letter. This is also a style, the immortal style of the Soviet intelligentsia, transferred to the 21st century: someone signs, someone protests, and someone is proudly silent and reads Mandelstam when they are allowed.

The same thing happens in conflict with Medinsky. Most of Raikin’s colleagues will never go to an open conflict with an omnipotent minister of culture, conveying a diverse engineers of human souls of the worldwide will. But Raikin is at risk - because he appears directly to the throne, recalls the awards that Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin personally presented him. The formula about the good king and bad boyars is old as the world - but it works. And no one said that he would not work this time. Raikin does not cross the boundaries of a departmental conflict, and this allows him to solve the most important task of his existence in Russian art - to remain “his own” for power, while being decent and indifferent to those who do not consider their Putin authorities.

This is a difficult task that requires monstrous moral compromises with oneself. I remembered the first such compromise for my whole life - when in an interview with Konstantin Raikin I read about the Russian education he received, that he was raised by a Russian man. I am not familiar with this Raikin, but I had the honor of knowing the present. Arkady Isaakovich was born, I would say that in a classic Jewish family, until the last years of life, he was proud of his roots. Of course, he did not advertise these roots (however, everyone knew about them), but they were important to him. With all his desire, Arkady Isaakovich and Ruf Markovna could not raise their children by Russians - and there is nothing shameful in this. Being a Jew is ashamed only when you want to please those who do not want to know anything about you present. When you want to be a servant of two gentlemen.

They will tell me that in the life of Arkady Isaakovich there were no less, or even more moral compromises than in the life of his son and heir. I will not argue with this. Arkady Raikin lived in the days of cannibals and desperately did not want to be eaten by them, on the contrary, tried to protect himself from them and protect the little man, to whom he gave several minutes of hope and courage to his art. Nobody forces Konstantin Raikin as he lives. He is Truffaldino out of habit.