Not only six young Moscow directors, master’s students in Viktor Ryzhakov’s workshop at the Moscow Art Theater School, participated in the project. But also the actors of the Mariupol Republican Academic Order “Badge of Honor” of the Russian Drama Theater. With them, the sketch of the play “Freeloader” was embodied by the St. Petersburg director Timur Nasirov, a student of the famous theater director and teacher Grigory Kozlov. By the way, St. Petersburg and Mariupol are sister cities.
“Like a breath of fresh air!”
“The Freeloader” was played on the tablet on a large stage, with spectators seated nearby. This had never happened before at the Masterovy Theater. “Today is our debut,” said the theater director.
– What caught my attention? Work is like work: you set tasks, try to solve them, meet deadlines… Meeting with the actors of Mariupol, communication with them, conversations, this is perhaps the most important thing. Wonderful, sincere guys. We talked about different things, not just the play, the representation, the theatrical processes from which they are separated, and suddenly theaters, people and spectators appeared that were new to them. A new director they are trying to discover. What do you want from them? “It’s like learning a new foreign language,” said Timur Nasirov.
The artists noted that it was the first time they participated in this format: an on-site creative laboratory, which published a sketch of the work in five days. When asked to share their impressions of the last lab (what it was like), they responded:
– Fast. Fun. Difficult. Productive. Extreme. Interesting. Invite more!
Valery Kapinus: For us the laboratory is a completely new format. On the one hand, this even caused fear, on the other hand, crazy interest. When we began to realize where we had ended up and what would ultimately come of it, we felt as if there was a breath of fresh air: we had finally escaped the daily routine of repertory theater. When you can just go on stage and behave like a hooligan, within the limits that the director will set for you.
As of 2022, our company had three full-time directors; Inviting someone “from outside” to the production was a problem. The Mariupol Theater was dormant for a long time, stewing, as they say, in its own juice, and now, when someone comes to us for a master class or a performance, we call it fresh air. This new trend allows artists to learn new things and develop. It is worth a lot, it is worth acting.
Georgy Lomakin: The repertoire of our theater does not include works by Turgenev. Rehearsals with the St. Petersburg director Timur Nasirov were very interesting. Of course, we would like to continue our work and present the play “Freeloader” on our stage. We thank the Theater of Nations, its director Evgeny Mironov, the Ministry of Culture, which supported the program, for this creative laboratory. The organization is very warm and friendly. After we felt isolated from the world during hostilities, this warmth and attention from caring people is especially heartfelt and important to us.
Meanwhile
Director Alexander Chebotarev worked with the actors of the Naberezhnye Chelny State Tatar Drama Theater named after Ayaz Gilyazov. His sketch is “Mugallima”, based on the work of Kazan playwright and Golden Mask winner Dina Safina. They played in Tatar (the Russian translation was done using headphones).
“Good people work in this theater, we have developed a creative and friendly environment during these five days. I enjoyed the work,” admitted the director. “We also!” – said the artists.
“This is my second lab where I worked with artists in another language,” Alexander shared. – The first experience is the publication of a sketch with Kazakh artists. Both stories are related to the history of the republics. Before starting to work with Tatar artists, I consulted with my Tatar friend, my classmate.
The text was translated into Tatar with the help of the author. The first three days we literally analyzed each phrase, unraveled the meanings: what, what… And then we switched to the Tatar language. In rehearsals I had the lyrics in Russian, the artists had them in Tatar. There was no textual improvisation. Only one scene, “Casting” (we call it an anecdote), was born using the sketch improvisation method.
“Mugallima” is a work about the struggle of Tatar women to overcome patriarchal religious structures. Women fight for their rights. In the early 19th and 20th centuries, the Tatar word “mugallima” was used to describe teachers in Tatar schools. The heroines of the work have real prototypes.
By the way
As Armando Diamante, director of the Masters Theater, said, three sketches from this laboratory will be accepted for work and the directors will be invited to present performances.
Direct speech
Viktor Ryzhakov, director, teacher and course director of the Moscow Art Theater School:
– Any laboratory for any theater employee, director, actor, artist is, above all, a place of complete professional security, a place in which all participants have the right to restore their experience, their acquired knowledge of “how to do” and begin. explore its nature again in the circumstances proposed in the new time. After all, theater is an art that exists in time, in what happens here and now… Here it is important to show courage, not be afraid to fall, make mistakes, not be afraid to take a step forward. false or on the wrong path. proof. Here it is more important to recover and not lose the capacity for Presence, to try again to experience the emotion and incurable desire to listen to this constantly changing world…
The goal of the laboratory is not the result of the work done, its goal is the very process of taking a step into the unknown, the desire to find and experience what only a person who is learning, once again putting on new “skates”, can experience. One step taken, any test is already a result. The rest does not matter. The study of the nature of theater, the search for a new language, a new expressiveness, the very fact of traveling into the unknown is the main criterion of laboratory research.
