MHT that we have lost

Not so long ago, when it became known about the appointment of Sergei Zhenovach to the Moscow Art Theater and I did not express delight about this, I was asked by different ones - very respectable - people: what is this appointment so bad? I will try to answer now, when it turned out that the new artistic director decided not to renew the contract with one of the most important directors who worked at the Art Theater under Tabakov, Konstantin Bogomolov.

The appointment of Zhenovach in the Moscow Art Theater cannot be considered outside the general context. And this context is as follows. Over the past years, the cultural space from improper art has been stripping in Russia. First of all, from the “wrong theater” : innovative, social, impudent, provocative, God -finding, anti -lrical, cosmopolitan - well, in general, Oekhatovs . It’s easier to deal with the theater than with literature and even than with Contemporary Art , - it depends too much on the state: on the budget, on the material base itself (site, equipment). The cleansing, first of all, is carried out by the Medinsky Ministry of Culture, headed by Mr.. There are a lot of hunters here and besides the Ministry of Culture-but it is somehow more importantly.

The Ministry of Culture has long realized that the cleaning of space should be carried out by the forces of the theater figures themselves, using conflicts, envy, and creative incompatibility in the art environment. This is a long tradition.

"Tell me, Boris Leonidovich, how do you feel about Mandelstam's poems?"

In Russia, the space of the “wrong theater” from time immemorial is very small. And the Moscow Art Theater was almost the first and, of course, the largest site on which he had a place.

Oleg Tabakov was not just a theater merchant of the first guild, acquiring everything that seemed to him interesting, bright, liquid. He was the defender and intercessor of all representatives of the new theater in the face of power and the advancing obscurantist. In his so -called supermarket for a long time, when no one had thought about it yet, the “terrorism” of the Presnyakov brothers appeared exotic for our regions (the new drama was just approaching the big scenes and suddenly - once! ”Cyril Serebrennikov stood on the scumbags of the country's main theater. Regarding the “man-podshka” of the same Serebrennikov or the “ideal husband” of Konstantin Bogomolov, the Moscow Art Theater will then be carried on the courts. The deputy Medinsky Mr. Zhuravsky will visit Tabakov himself, with a request (almost demand) to prevent “ideal husbands” in the repertoire of Moscow art. But Tabakov until the end of his life - and truly knightly - defended everyone in whom he believed.

The Ministry of Culture very clearly marked the boundaries in which he would like to see a modern scene.

When appointing a new artistic director of the Moscow Art Theater, the question stood simply: will Sergey Zhenovach be able to and want, behind which the Ministry of Culture and the Critics-Consultants loomed behind him (the most interesting topic that requires a separate conversation), take on this role of Tabakov-Oskor? The point is not how bad or good are the Genovach’s own performances (I repeat what I said before: I nostalgically recall many of them and I love the studio of theatrical art), but in whether the space of the “other theater”, which was an important overshadow of which was the Moscow Art Theater, is not narrowed with his arrival. As he understands, what his curators expect from him - that was the question.

The Ministry of Culture very clearly marked the boundaries in which he would like to see a modern scene. The authorities want to see her safe-free, without any bad excesses. Sergei Zhenovach meets these requirements by virtue of the very nature of his talent: acute sociality, politics, anti -aclyricalism, interest in the dark sides of the human soul - these are not his cup of tea. And to health! We love him for completely different qualities.

But where to go to those who do not answer them? One of them, recall, has long been sitting under house arrest. The second does not have its own theater and now (after Sergey Zhenovach refused to extend the contract with him) loses one of his most important sites. Another, Timofei Kulyabin, survived the destruction of his Tangazer, and gave the shelter such as he, the director of the Novosibirsk Theater and one of the best managers of our country, Boris Mazhrich has long received a wolf ticket and cannot work in a specialty. "Theater . DOC ”lost his founders overnight, and now it will now be more difficult to survive than before. Although, it would seem, much more difficult if the survival was paid for two deaths.

I can continue this martyrologist - but perhaps I will stop.

I sincerely wish Zhenovach’s good, success and sincerely want him to be fine. But I want everything to be good for the Russian theater as a whole - and its development is inconceivable without a risk zone. Without a well -known fraction of madness. Without fruitful failures. Now one of the key venues has been selected from this area of ​​risk, not giving the other in return. And, according to a long tradition, they took away with their hands not some bureaucratic monster, but a director with a good reputation and real (not invented, not mythical) merits to the theater.

The founders of the Moscow Art Theater, in which the Zhenovach was appointed, were also extremely talented people (and one - and even by a genius), but in the very composition of their art there was something that allowed the Stalin’s officials to make the Moscow Art Theater of the USSR to the Stalin’s officials - so that it was precisely his name to destroy everything unlike and undesirable. All this, of course, does not cancel the greatness of the Moscow Art Theater, as it does not cancel the advantages of Zhenovach. But there is a suspicion that we are entering this river for the second time. Simply put, we enter the era of the new Zhdanishchina with awarding aesthetically “correct” theatrical figures and the cowardly silence of all interested parties.

Well, something, but we can keep silent.