"The audience was not a guide"

On May 10, the media reported that the audience of the Opera and Ballet Theater of Buryatia booed a production dedicated to Victory Day. They interrupted reading the letters of a soldier from Ulan-Ude, who died during the Great Patriotic War, and the fulfillment of the quartet Shostakovich by Moscow musicians.

I was at a concert in Opera on May 9.

True, for now, in hot pursuit, I did not want to write. For its reasons.

But when “about the exploits, about the glory” of our theater, they again write on federal resources, and Artem Varhaftik himself discusses what happened in his FB, the evening, as the hero of Shukshin said, ceases to be languid. Because the number of those who "did not read Pasternak himself," but knows exactly how it was, how it would be and what the heart will calm down, and therefore the number of speculations, lies, stupid things, aggression and even conspiracy versions crossed all the permissible limits!

Let me describe at first just as it was. There is a black office on the stage, on the back is a small rectangle of the screen, at the left curtains of the piano. A pianist came out, Schumanan's “dreams” began to play, documentary photos of the Great Patriotic War went to this elegiac music on the screen. After the departure of the retails from the wings on the right, the young man took out a microphone on a rack and a pupiter. Erzhena Zhambalova came out, made a preamble about a small and great historical time and began to read letters to the young man, our fellow countryman Mikhail Turoshev, provided by the National Museum of the Republic of Belarus. About ten minutes everything was calm. Then some tension began to increase in the hall, which suddenly broke through with sudden applause in the stalls. I looked at my watch, it was the 18th minute of reading letters. Further, I did not follow the time, because it became clear - the disaster begins. After some time, applause flashed again, in the left wing of the amphitheater. Then they began to clap in the right wing, they were picked up. Finally, they slammed everywhere, and there was “enough”, “go away”. The honor, apparently, sharply reduced the read and intonation emphasized that the last letter was written by young men of such and such a number of such and such a year. The lines of the letter drowned in applause. All the time reading on the screen, leaflets of these letters were shown.

Then Erzhena Zhambalova came out ahead and announced the work of Shostakovich, telling the story of his creation that the composer came to Berlin, to write music for the film was in the 60th year, and in Berlin he was told about the horrors of concentration camps, and he threw the music for the film, but wrote the quarter, and here the artist was introduced by the memory of the victims of fascism and the memory of the victims War.

All the time of this story on the screen was a photograph of a rather young, Shchekstoy Shostakovich in a helmet, which looked like a German Kaiser helmet. Then Artem Vargaftik in the FB explained that this is a helmet of the Leningrad Firefighter. But either the image used by the theater was poor -quality, or the screen was overlapped with sofites, but it was impossible to see that the cockade on the helmet was not. In the mind, the type of such helmet is firmly connected only with the Germans of the First World War. And no one began to inform the public that Shostakovich’s blockade and in the blockade was dropped in incendiary bombs from the roofs of houses. Indeed, why?

The musicians came out, they sat down for a long time, but the instruments did not tune in, they just sat for a long time. They slammed them and someone said loudly: "Start already!" Finally, they started. They were listened, but somewhere from the middle they began to slam, and when the final fourth part began, slow, viscous, the audience broke completely.

At the end of their performance, Erzhen Zhambalov went to the public that the evening came to an end and they thank everyone and congratulate everyone on Victory Day, I didn’t hear further because: a) her words drowned in the laugh of the public, b) I could no longer physically endure this shame and jumped out of the hall.

This is the texture.

And now I will allow myself to work a little and make a analysis.

Well, bright, I would even say enlightened, Schuman's music became a counterpoint to the paintings of destruction and death broadcast on the screen. We are such, as it were, already ascended over horrors, we are already in the power of exalted sorrows. I repeat, well, let it be. But this is the first and last manifestation of the directorial will in all this "action".

The format, the situation on the stage, the topic, and this ascended instruction suggest laconicism, the absence of fuss and some statue. And therefore, the appearance of an ordinary young man, of course, the most commonly carried out a microphone and a pupeiter who twisted something there, immediately collapsed the abstract, contemplative state and the direction of thoughts and feelings. The appearance of a fourth of a degree did not raise. She somehow appeared so that she did not appear, but as if sniffed, darted. In a black dress with short sleeves, with black hair, stood on a black background. We do not see the artist, we see five spots: from under the hem, short segments of the legs, segments of the arms, cuts of the dress under the throat, the neck disappears, so immediately above the dress, the face framed by a completely household hairstyle. As my friend says, costume designer, "the head is not solved."

Yes, in fact, the whole look is not solved!

For the uninitiated - there are certain laws of the genre. If you look at the monoplays or readers' programs of large actresses, you will notice that their hands are almost always closed to the wrists, their legs are mainly closed. Nothing should distract from the only, in this case, the artist’s instruments - face, eye, mouth. Nothing should distract from the word and from meanings. But at the same time, everything should attract attention to the artist. The canonical example of the importance of the actress’s outfit is described in the novel by Maugham Theater. This does not mean that Zhambalova was supposed to go out in a dress of silver brocade with a scarlet scarf, but to think that we had to somehow “fight off” from the black background, both the director and the reading itself were supposed to. Color, shape, style. Clothing on stage never clothes, but always an image. Always. This is iron.

There is another canonical example of the significance of such "trifles." At the farewell concert of Claudia Schulzhenko, the last song was not declared, but the singer quickly moved out from behind the cululis, raising her hand over her head, in which a small flap of bright-vasic color was cut! The hall did not get up, the hall soared, ascended! ..

In stage language, all this is a dress, its style, length, color, hairstyle, some objects, all this is called signs, codes. In the theater, we talk with the public codes in order to communicate in the same language in order to unite and unite. And this is a professional alphabet. And it is surprising that the director Vladimir Bocharov, a student of Vladimir Mirzoev, apparently does not know the alphabet. There was not a single code in this "action". Not a single sign combined the hall and stage. But the topic is not a letter! The topic just as Pushkin wrote - the fate of human, fate folk! The topic is our general pain, common grief, grief, which we still cannot survive the whole country, our total price of victory. And it was not necessary to pronounce any individual words about some historical times small and big, about the fact that our victory consisted of such boys-this is all demagogy and a common place! We will tell you this ourselves, because there is no family in Russia, where it would not be remembered for its hero. Who went out here?! Children of war? Those who were born with this knowledge?

Who in childhood saw with their own eyes the bumy, legless front -line soldiers on low "ottomans" - catalogs, who are gathering in the central market, near the central department store, near the gastronomist on the street. Lenin, where is now Polin, at the station. Those who saw how the prisoners of the Japanese were bridge. Kirova, where Galexi is now, and built an opera theater. Those who remember the eternal feeling of hunger and grocery cards. It was for them, like degenerates, they chewed what victory made of?

It was necessary to read these letters so that in the third letter the hall did not breathe, because a lump in the throat. And if for some reason the letters of the 18-year-old guy reads the Matron, then, probably, both the director and the artist, were supposed to, as we, the theatrical ones, are called to justify such a decision. At least, the first thing that comes in my, not very concerned for the search for the director's key and the acting move, is that the artist, the mother of three children, grandmother’s grandchildren, would be quite organic to read these letters from the position of the mother, who remains instead of her son, this is his simple banal household, and she reads - a tank for the tank. Year after year. And then the artist would not have to come up with some stupid fake intonation, some stupid aspiration. And then, behind each letter, not one, but two destinies, two people would have risen. And then, perhaps, the monotony of the reading would be justified and understanding the endless monotony of texts-the mother is not like every letter, every gleam of roads!

Or some other decision, another move, director and actress had to find. If they are professionals, of course.

And the texts are monotonous because neither the director nor the artist bothering themselves with any literary composition. Not a writer, not a wise husband, wrote letters, that their author died in the war, does not make letters automatically in such a way as to read each letter from beginning to end in a row. The content of the text of the pronounced from the stage had to be washed like gold. This is work. From the "Taped" it was necessary to compile drama, complicated by the observance of chronology. This is an even more difficult, painstaking work. I would even say this is a head.

And why the artist and director Golovnyak? This is on one day of the venture. Go out and make sure. What are the problems? As they say, with the beauty of this, you sing a craftswoman. Well, do not get away. Go out and make sure. Well, they were killed, and the audience was not a pup. I did not get the same.

Again, if the director and artist were concerned about the musical and visual design of reading, maybe it would have been rolled.

Listen, a joint project with the National Museum. When my mother carried the documents of her uncle, who became the chairman of the Government of the Republic of Belarus after the arrest of Yerbanov, they did not take them into the National Museum. Because they have all sorts of documents such as Gutalin’s Uncle Cat Matroskin. So is it really that the National Museum is only a photograph of a soldier and only his letters?! Well, no. So why should we talk with a slight subvigor, separate words that the fate of this boy reflected the fate of thousands of our other boys that there was a whole generation in the fate of this boy. Show us these boys, show this generation of our fellow countrymen, our relatives! You look at how infinitely valuable is the tape on Facebook on May 9 - we look and look at the faces of the distant loved ones of our friends, and sometimes enemies, we admire, hug, cry, support, sympathize. Our distant loved ones unite us! What if the younger brothers and sisters shown on the screen would be in the hall, because the vast majority of the public were people born in the 40s. Children of the war ... Someone would have read a familiar surname, someone would see the name of their village, district, streets. The richest archive at the National Museum, documents, artifacts, I repeat, like Gutalin.

But no, this is the same to hang out a whole screen only in order to meditate on it and the same leaves of paper with illegibly written words on it. Of course, after all, in order to create a playlist of video broadcasting, you must burst into the documents. This is work. Heavy, emotionally costly, painstaking. And from these documents, then also to compose drama. Why? This is one day. Go out and make sure. Well, they were killed.

I will not talk about the sound design. Because he simply was not there. Well, that is, the whole bet was made only on the voice and intonation of the artist, and what it was all out of itself. At the same time, to talk about how much the sound has sound, noise and sound scores, even somehow indecent, this is so an integral part of the stage action.

I will add about the video sequence that went during the performance of the quartet, officially/formally dedicated to the memory of the victims of fascism and the war, written, according to Zhambalova, impressed by the stories about the horrors of concentration camps, on the white screen showed: a pistol, a penknife, a mug, a mug, a spoon, an soap room, a flask, again a pistol, or a revolver, a piece, a piece of a piece, a piece, a piece of it, a piece of it, a piece of it, a piece A piece of bread. The “high” plan was probably that these are not just household items, but artifacts of war. But contrary to the designer’s plan, the audience did not experience any pytet to these subjects, only irritation. Again, if the project is joint with the National Museum, then there are so many artifacts in the museum! But they must again be selected, arranged, connected with each other. For the sake of one show? Who needs it?

The quartet was executed mediocre.

And the audience came out of the shores.

Leaving the auditorium, the first thing I said is that the organizers of this will not come up with anything better than to declare the public to the whole world as a fool. Which did not fail to do.

Now about the audience. As already mentioned above, the vast majority of the public were pensioners, children of the war. So organizedly they fall into theaters through the advice of veterans and trade union committees at the place of their former works. Ticket distributors come to these tips and trade union committees when tickets are not sold through the cash register, and the hall must be scored.

And in general, of course, the target audience of 9-May concerts is just pensioners. The advice of veterans, when they convene their ranks for such events, also press codes - a holiday, a concert, an opera theater. The generation of 60–70-year-olds is firmly held by stereotypes both due to age and by virtue of education. Their belief that they sing and dance at the Opera Theater. And point. And on May 9, everyone sings Katyusha and Cossacks in Berlin and dance Russian. And point. And they are incredibly stubborn, if something went not in accordance with their expectations, they will demand that this immediately correspond to something. They will demand loudly, angrily, and restlessly. And here is exactly the saying - they are not like that, they have such life. They were constantly deceived and deceived. Therefore, they are so intolerant even to a hint of deception, they can not tolerate disappointment. And nothing can be done about it. Yes, in a sterile laboratory situation, they could, out of respect for the memory of this Misha Turoshev, sit and be silent, finish, finally. But the situation was not sterile, but they are people with worn nerves.

If the theater’s leadership planned such a non -trivial move on May 9 professionally, and not, as we are accepted, on the knee, then it was necessary to change the target audience, and, accordingly, change the sales strategy. Why? We will go out, reduce, let it say more than thanks. Well, in general, change the strategy, do not change, it is obvious that work with the viewer as such has fallen in the theater. The PR of this particular concert was failed. His concept is failed, and this is not a concept. Here we have a piano, here we have a reading, but here a quartik is - it is tempting to add to such a "concept" "but here I wrapped fish."

... I tried to talk with some spectators in the lobby, explain something. Firstly, they do not want to hear anything. And secondly, and here I just take off their hat in front of them, they counted everything right! They were outraged by the attitude of the organizers of the concert, the way they prepared it. The point is not only that the audience expected the victorious pop, but that the audience considered this generally not a lot of disrespect and indifference to her, and to the topic, and to Shostakovich, and to this poor guy who has become a bargaining coin. And this enraged the audience.

Time is such, such a day - you can’t deceive.

Although, however, they won. They, as they say, are fences, and Misha Turosheva, and the memory of him, and music, and the audience, putting it in front of the whole country with vandals and moral freaks.

In this theater, they either forgot or do not know, most likely, they do not know, another law - the theater is responsible for failure.

Even if the director and artists, and all the workshops will work perfectly, but the failure happened, the responsibility is not in public, but still in the theater. Because in fact, the audience never knows, even when she knocks her legs and demands something, she does not know that the theater creates a request from the public. And this one request is catharsis. The theater was invented by humanity for this.

And therefore there is another law of the theater - to use the audience low and dishonorable as a fig sheet to cover its mediocrity and professional helplessness, its irresponsibility.

In general, of course, the young man Vladimir Bocharov has a unique talent, a few years ago he staged a disastrous performance in Bourdram on Dostoevsky’s “player”, a year ago full compilation and epigonism is a boring and sluggish “travis”, now he had failed a concert for such an important day, but to direct the scandaling throughout the country, to the public for which he did nothing, to expose elderly people, to put elderly people with fools. And savages, he got two counts. Well done, the guy will go far.

PS Shostakovich wrote a quartet not in Berlin.

PPS on May 9, an absolute, one hundred percent failure occurred on the opera stage.

In general, the sequel should be.

Tuyana Budaeva - Theater

The "Opinion" expressed in the heading of the point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial office