The theater as a place for public entertainment has lost some of its power with the advent of television in our lives. However, there are still performances that are very popular. A vivid proof of this is the "King Lear" of the "Satyricon". The audience's feedback on this colorful performance encourages many residents and guests of the capital to return to the theater again and enjoy the performance of professional actors.

What is the piece about?

The plot of the work "King Lear" in the "Satyricon" is played by the actors in a special way, taking into account all modern trends in art. The action takes place in Great Britain, time - the XI century. The legendary ruler - King Lear - plans to leave the throne, but for this he needs to divide his possessions between three heirs. Unable to share everything equally, the ruler asks each of them about how much she appreciates, respects and loves him. The older sisters lie desperately, and the youngest daughter, named Cordelia, declares that her love cannot be measured in worldly values. Lear does not believe the girl and disowns her, driving her away together with her protector, the Earl of Kent. As a result, the kingdom is divided in half between the two eldest heirs.

Soon, the new rulers host a reception where they show their real faces. The King is horrified by his blindness and how fake he has raised his own children. The political situation in the kingdom is escalating every day, and as a result, the elder daughters drive Lear out of their own palace, leaving only the faithful jester with him. In parallel with this, a storyline develops, in which the Earl of Gloucester, his own son Edgar and the illegitimate Edmund take part.

In the steppe, Gloucester joins Lear, as well as the only defender of Cordelia - Kent. The daughters of the king want to kill their father, the illegitimate son of Gloucester also wants to take the life of a parent in order to receive an inheritance. The company falls into a trap and the old count loses his sight, Edgar takes custody of him, who even has to kill the servant sent to finish what he started.

According to literary critics, the problem of fathers and children in the play "King Lear" should be considered the real tragedy. "Satyricon" significantly enhances the degree of drama, which allows you to feel the spirit of a cruel era. Cordelia decides to go to war against her own sisters, and as a result of the battle, she and her father are prisoners in prison. Edmund intends to kill both, and for this he even bribes one of the prison officers. Thanks to the Duke of Albany, the plans of the illegitimate son of Gloucester become known to everyone, and he dies in a duel with his half-brother.

A repentant Edmund, being on his deathbed, tries to cancel his order, but Cordelia is already dead. One of the sisters poisoned the other and then committed suicide, unable to bear the grief. The king takes the body of his youngest daughter out of prison, after which he dies. Edgar tells that his father could not overcome all the misfortunes that fell on his head, and also departed to another world. The Earl of Kent declares that he would like to leave after the king, but submits to the Duke of Albany, who restores his status at court.

about the author

The idea of ​​staging the play “King Lear” in the “Satyricon” has been in the air since the very beginning of the 2000s, and it is connected primarily with interest in the personality of the author. William Shakespeare, who wrote this tragedy, is known as one of the greatest playwrights on the planet, his works have been translated into almost all existing languages. Being a resident of London, he became not only a successful writer, but also a talented actor, as well as the head of the theater studio "Servants of the King".

A huge number of questions raises the personality of the writer, since the small legacy of documents that has survived today does not allow one to form a specific idea of ​​​​her. Some literary critics believe that such an author as Shakespeare did not exist at all, and all his works were created by other people, however, the vast majority of researchers of his personality reject this point of view.

King Lear is by far considered one of the finest tragedies ever written in the English language. Shakespeare received a large number of accolades during his lifetime, especially from Victorians and representatives of romanticism. Even in the 21st century, his work is the subject of study by the world's leading literary scholars, who rethink the work of the British author in accordance with the current cultural situation in society.

It is believed that the creation of the work of the English writer was inspired by a legend originating from ancient times. The legend of daughters who betrayed their own father was not translated into English until the 14th century. It is known that at the end of the 16th century in the theaters of Britain the premiere of a production called “The Tragic History of King Lear” was successfully held, some literary critics believe that its author is Shakespeare, who later gave the play a new name. There are also documents confirming that Shakespeare completed work on the play only in 1606. Thus, the question of the authorship of the work is still open.

Despite this, one of the most popular performances in Moscow for several years in a row has been “King Lear” in the “Satyricon”, reviews of this unusual production attract art lovers here every year. Some of them are happy to talk about how relevant the thesis of the play is for today, and discuss it during the intermission or after the performance.

Who embodies medieval passions on stage?

One of the main components of the success of "King Lear" in the "Satyricon" is the actors and roles, correctly distributed between them. The star of the production is Konstantin Raikin, who took over the management of the theater in 1987 after the death of his father, the famous satirist Arkady Raikin. Critics note that it is thanks to his original reading of the king's personality that the performance looks incredibly organic, and the viewer willy-nilly begins to empathize with the characters.

Since members of the theater troupe are also involved in the production of films, it is often necessary to form a reserve staff for productions. This fate did not bypass the “King Lear” in the “Satyricon”, the actors and the roles distributed between them rarely, but still change. For example, the role of Prince Edgar is alternately played by Daniil Pugaev, and although both of them at one time played less significant characters. The distribution of roles is most often carried out several months before the start of the season, so the actors can build their work schedule in advance.

Only after watching the performance, the viewer can understand why it was necessary to stage King Lear in the Satyricon: the actors here give all their best, trying to give the audience the maximum pleasure from watching. The roles of the Dukes of Albany, Conuel and Burgundy are consistently assigned to Konstantin Tretyakov and Yakov Lomkin. All these experienced actors have been working in the theater for more than 10 years, and there is simply no replacement for these bright specialists in this performance.

All female characters are at the mercy of the most talented actresses who manage to combine theater and cinema, for example, Glafira Tarkhanova, known to a wide range of viewers, plays Cordelia. The roles of the other two daughters, Goneril and Regan, are played by Marina Drovosekova and Agrippina Steklova, the girls do not have understudies, so you can see them at every performance. The jester in the production of the theater has a highly developed feminine principle, therefore his ladies play - Elena Bereznova and Elizaveta Kardenas.

According to theatergoers, the production is very popular due to the presence of Konstantin Raikin, who plays King Lear. The performance of "Satyricon", the actors involved in it, the situation - all this pales against the background of the talent of the son of a satirist famous in the Soviet Union. However, they note, the king remains such only against the background of his retinue, so the role of each member of the troupe in the production is quite large.

Without whom, the performance would not have taken place?

The production is directed by Konstantin Raikin, who started working with the theater in 2002. Already by that time he had become famous for his debut work - the play “Waiting for Godot”. An unusual reading of Beckett's work brought him two prestigious awards at once - the Golden Mask and the prize of the Christmas Parade festival. It is in the theater. Lensoviet Raikin saw the director's talented productions, after which he decided to offer him cooperation.

Outside of time and space - the basic principle of Butusov's "King Lear" in the "Satyricon" - the viewer will not be able to determine where and at what time the action takes place. This is a traditional approach to staging a performance, but it is in this theater that it helps to create an original and complete picture of the action. The stage is completely empty: at first glance, it resembles a warehouse of scenery that has not been used for a long time, this is a symbol of the timeless space of a story that can happen anytime and anywhere.

A number of huge red doors, sheets of plywood, boards - all this should demonstrate to the viewer that the whole world is in real ruin, and the theater is a mirror of this era, which impartially demonstrates reality. The main task that Butusov sets for himself is to constantly take his guests in the auditorium out of the "comfort zone", which is why the action takes place in various parts of the stage, and the characters appear on stage in the most unexpected way.

It is worth noting the madness of the protagonist, which is very clearly expressed in the “King Lear” of the “Satyricon”. The director deliberately increases the degree of madness. At the same time, historical features are left aside, the heroes are approximately in the 20th century, this is evidenced by their clothes and appearance. Politics is also left aside here, although there are a large number of scenes in the performance that, if desired, can be shifted to the existing reality.

Does the audience like the performance?

Since at least twice a month the theater troupe shows the performance “King Lear” in the “Satyricon” for the audience, there are more and more reviews about this performance. The guests of the theater are mostly satisfied with the production, in their opinion, the main theses of the play are presented in such a way that they make them want to start taking care of their relatives and friends. Despite the need to constantly keep the audience in suspense, the actors do not abuse this, allowing their guests to draw their own conclusions during the performance.

Also, as the merits of the production, the audience singles out a well-coordinated ensemble of actors, where everyone is in their place and favorably sets off other colleagues. The musical accompaniment of the performance, created by its director, Yuri Butusov, deserves special attention, and allows forming a single integral picture of the action. A large number of bright scenographic techniques, used in the most unexpected way, allow the audience to experience a real emotional shock in the finale, which is the director's goal.

The cast also, according to the audience, deserves the most real awards. Earlier in the play “King Lear” of “Satyricon”, reviews quite often touched on the play of Maxim Averin, better known to the public for the role of Major Glukharev. In this theatrical production, he played the role of Edmond for several years, but due to the demand in the cinema, he was withdrawn from the play.

Despite the departure of Averin, a large number of talented actors are still involved in the play, which is also noted by the audience. A rare performance does without flowers, which are presented by grateful fans to the performers of the main roles in King Lear. The first act seems to some of them a bit long, however, they perceive it as a kind of filter through which those who are obviously not ready to plunge into the world of the performance will not pass.

Perhaps, it is this name that will come up first at the mention of the theater "Satyricon", "King Lear". In reviews of the performance, the audience is often amazed at the tricks performed by the man. The actor has been appearing on stage in the image of a monarch for more than 10 years and every time he surprises the guests of his theater - in several performances he even managed to stand on his head. Raikin's deep emotions, the scenes of contradictions brilliantly played by him, the energy of chaos - all this makes the audience constantly come to this production over and over again.

What needs to be improved?

Nothing is perfect, and viewers sometimes find a number of negative points even in children's performances designed for a completely different psychology. The “King Lear” of the “Satyricon” is no exception to the rule: in the reviews, the audience often notes that the actors are too expressive and in some cases they clearly overact. It is quite possible that this is true, since a creative person, passionate about his work, sometimes really forgets about everything and devotes himself entirely to the process. However, whether to consider this a disadvantage, everyone decides for himself.

Also quite controversial for some viewers are the moments when the actors involved in the production use bright expressive means: kicks, spitting, sweeping the stage. The guests of the theater believe that the staging of such a grandiose work could have done with other, more cultural methods that would be understandable to the Russian mentality.

Some viewers who know the director's work and who have visited King Lear, Satyricon, in their reviews note the presence of a large number of clichés that are repeated in a number of productions. In their opinion, the “symbol for the sake of a symbol” technique is often used, when one or another technique does not fit into the general staging system, but rather falls out of it, having no cultural connections with its components. Ladies are particularly negative about the way men are exposed on stage, they believe that this is unacceptable for the theater.

Some guests of the theater also have questions to the performer of the main role. They believe that Konstantin Raikin plays the role of the king in such a way that the latter seems like a notorious jester, and this does not go well with the tragic plot of the work. In this case, it is worth noting that we are still talking about the theater of satire, which is why the director conceived such an original and unusual production.

Some actors do not reach the level of their acting skills to play in the production of “King Lear” of “Satyricon” - in the reviews, the audience notes that during the performances one sometimes feels falsity and insincerity. There are also comments on the costumes of the characters, which often resemble everyday clothes, found only in people with antisocial behavior. Fortunately, the theater management listens to these reviews and even changes some fragments of the performance in order to make the viewer more comfortable, so there are more positive responses every time.

Professional opinion

Critics greeted "King Lear" very ambiguously, the performance of "Satyricon" and to this day is subjected to careful analysis. Especially professional appraisers of theatrical creativity are confused by excessive expressiveness and a huge emotional palette used by actors. In their opinion, the vast majority of the troupe members involved in this performance overact, which does not benefit the performance.

Some critics who have watched several versions of the aforementioned performance express the idea that what they saw in the Satyricon was somehow repeated in Butusov's previous productions. Copying their own creativity, in their opinion, cannot be considered as creative growth. Similarly, the character of Konstantin Raikin is considered, critics do not see the original incarnation of Lear in the play, he seems to be woven from hundreds of different kings played earlier.

There are also defenders of the performance who know perfectly well what the Satyricon Theater is. They see King Lear as a production that has nothing to do with Shakespeare's classic. A game without rules, without a definite finish and a path to it - all these are the hallmarks of Butusov's work, who perceives his production as an unusual game. The protagonist appears to fans of the play as an inexplicable person who combines the features of a child, a tyrant and an old man. Lear does not understand what is happening around him, and at some point he naturally begins to go crazy, discovering the vices of the people around him.

Insight comes at the most critical moments for each character in the play. Each of the sisters goes crazy in her own way, passionately and emotionally, the actresses, according to critics, give all the best, wanting to convey to their viewers the idea of ​​the need for respect and reverence in the family. Lear's insight, which comes to him through tears and laughter, is combined with pain and horror, expressed in a bright finale, where the king unsuccessfully tries to seat his dead heirs at the piano, and they constantly fall. The old man's desire to return to the past, where the children were happy and loved each other, is quite understandable, but, alas, untimely.

Why is it worth going to the production of "Satyricon"?

The original reading of the British classic and the use of techniques that allow "embedding" the narrative into any time frame are among the main reasons to visit "King Lear" in the "Satyricon". The duration of the performance is 3 hours, so you should mentally prepare in advance. The production has only one 15-minute intermission, during which you can admire the exposition of photographs of theater actors and visit the local buffet.

Despite the fact that the performance was created according to a classic literary work, an age limit is imposed on it - children under 12 years old are not recommended to attend it. There are many reasons for this - including the demonstration by the main character of his underwear. If you are going to see "King Lear" in the "Satyricon", it is forbidden to take photos of the production and video recording, as well as at any other similar event - this is worth remembering. If this prohibition is not observed, violators may be subject to an administrative fine, and in case of distribution of pirated video recordings, the theater, as the owner of the copyright for the performance, has the right to file a lawsuit.

The remarks of culturologists and art lovers are always taken into account when preparing for the screening of King Lear in the Satyricon: the duration of the performance in the theater indicates that it has been in demand for 12 years now. If you want to get real aesthetic pleasure from going to the theater, it is best to get acquainted with Shakespeare's book in advance, as well as with literary works that were written by leading researchers of this writer's work. Special impressions are guaranteed to those who can read the tragedy in the original.

How to buy tickets?

If you want to see a production of King Lear at the Satyricon, it's best to buy tickets months in advance, as they sell out very quickly. The cost of an entrance counter mark ranges from 1 to 6 thousand rubles, it will directly depend on the chosen place. The most expensive place will cost, located almost in front of the stage - in sector A, the minimum price here is 2 thousand rubles (row 11), the maximum - 6 (from rows 1 to 5). The most profitable tickets can be bought in the left or right box, they cost from 1 to 1.5 thousand rubles, but there is a significant drawback here - part of the stage will not be visible, which will not allow you to fully enjoy the performance.

Since tickets are sold out in advance, it is best to decide on the date of the trip to King Lear in the Satyricon in a couple of months, it is better to choose places in the central part of the hall in order to see absolutely all the action. However, here everything will depend on the availability of free finances, so the decision is yours. Tickets can be purchased at the box office of the theater itself, as well as at numerous universal points of sale, where counterfeits are sold for absolutely all performances in Moscow and the region.

How to get to the theatre?

Before going to a cultural institution, be sure to specify on which stage King Lear will be shown: the Satyricon has several venues, the main one - at Sheremetyevskaya, 8 - is currently under reconstruction. The exact timing of the completion of the repair is unknown, so the performances are now being shown at other venues. Two of them are located next to the theater - along Sheremetyevskaya street, in houses 2 and 6/2. The easiest way to get there is by metro, you will need to get off at the Maryina Roshcha station.

It is quite possible that other venues will also host the production of "King Lear" "Satyricon", the addresses of these creative spaces are Arbat, 24 and 26. Despite the fact that these buildings house two stages of the Theater. Vakhtangov, actors and spectators loyally share them with their guests from the theater of satire. Since the Arbat is closed to public transport, the easiest way is to get to the nearest metro stations - Smolenskaya or Arbatskaya, and then walk a little along one of the oldest streets in Moscow.

	King Lear (Konstantin Raikin, left) and Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov). King Lear is not afraid of madness, but hastens it Photo by Pavel Smertin / Kommersant
	Roman Dolzhansky. . "King Lear" in "Satyricon" ( Kommersant, 09.10.2006). Oleg Zintsov. . In the "Satyricon" they made a performance for growth ( Vedomosti, 09.10.2006). Grigory Zaslavsky. . "King Lear" at the theater "Satyricon" ( NG, 09.10.2006). Irina Korneeva. . Konstantin Raikin played King Lear ( RG, 09.10.2006). Marina Davydova. ( Izvestia, 09.10.2006). Dina Goder. . The premiere of "King Lear" in "Satyricon" with Raikin in the role of a mad monarch was deafening with music, running around and Lear, similar to a Hasid ( Gazeta.Ru, 9.10.2006). Anna Gordeeva. . Yuri Butusov staged "King Lear" in "Satyricon" ( News time, 10/10/2006). Gleb Sitkovsky. Yuri Butusov staged Shakespeare's tragedy in "Satyricon" ( Newspaper, 10.10.2006). Irina Alpatova. . "King Lear" by W. Shakespeare. Theater Satyricon ( Culture, 12.10.2006). Natalya Kazmina. . Shakespeare re-read and re-read at the Satyricon Theater ( MN, 10/13/2006). Olga Fuchs. . Konstantin Raikin played King Lear in the play by Yuri Butusov ( VM, 09.10.2006). Marina Zayonts. . In "Satyricon" Yuri Butusov staged "King Lear", where Konstantin Raikin played, perhaps, the most difficult role of the world theatrical repertoire ( Results, 10/15/2006). Alexey Filippov. . The production by Yuri Butusov will also be of interest to those who have never read King Lear ( Russian courier, 10/16/2006). Elena Dyakova. . "King Lear". Theater "Satyricon" ( Novaya Gazeta, 10/16/2006). Marina Kvasnitskaya. ( Russia, 19.10.2006).

King Lear. Satyricon. Press about the play

Kommersant, October 9, 2006

broken kingdom

"King Lear" in "Satyricon"

The Moscow theater "Satyricon" opened the season with the premiere of a performance based on Shakespeare's tragedy "King Lear" staged by Yuri Butusov. The title role was played by the artistic director of the theater Konstantin Raikin. By ROMAN DOLZHANSKY.

Now it is time for critics to write thoughtful articles about the reasons for yet another Shakespeareanization of the entire country. Only last week there were two premieres in Moscow: "Antony and Cleopatra" in "Sovremennik" and "King Lear" in "Satyricon". Impressions from Lear by Lev Dodin and Hamlet by the same Yuri Butusov at the Moscow Art Theater are still fresh. "King Lear" in the "Satyricon" as a guest who came as if from nowhere - and without a specific case. Such visitors only annoy someone, but in the theater, especially, they can turn out to be more interesting than business partners. This time, the new version of Shakespeare's tragedy finally "leaves" without explaining its intentions.

"King Lear" tradition has long allowed to play in isolation from a specific soil. And there is nothing surprising in the fact that even the most meticulous viewer will never determine where and when the action of Yuri Butusov's performance takes place. It is placed outside of geography or history, because it is set on the ruins of a theater - not the Satyricon, of course, God forbid all theaters stand on their feet as firmly and meaningfully as this one does - but on the ruins, one might say, of the world theater. The scene of the "Satyricon" is exposed by Butusov's constant co-author artist Alexander Shishkin to the brick backdrop and most of all looks like a scenery warehouse. Massive red doors lead to nowhere; irrelevant pictures are seen - from some other performances, plywood sheets and boards are ready to become material for some more productions, and the uneven cast gray mass that covers the floor reminds of waste rock heaps.

Yuri Butusov is not afraid to add more and more kilograms to this substance. Judging by this performance, he does not belong to the directors who are languishing over the gold of their own design - without hesitation, he sends to the dumps what might have seemed dear to him ten minutes ago. Such decisions are scattered throughout the performance, but the director easily abandons any of them in favor of something new. As long as it becomes another external irritant for the viewer, whether it be some strange object of design, the transfer of action to the corners of the wide proscenium of the Satyricon, or the appearance of an unexpected intonation - like the crowing of Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov) hiding in the piano, the appearance of white death masks on on the faces of the actors - or a strong semantic accent: Butusov's Lear strangles the jester, who, contrary to custom, is played here not by an actor, but by an actress.

Since the world lies in ruins, there is no demand from the theater: what is left is visible. And from what exactly these or those fragments remained, think for yourself. Having let go of a beard (however, not long), Konstantin Raikin plays Lear not as a king, but as a preoccupied, stubborn person, focused on some important thought for him alone. A lot of things in his game may not seem too well drawn, until you suddenly get the feeling that Raikin's Lear really wants to go crazy - he is not afraid of madness and does not pretend to be crazy, but earnestly longs for clouding his mind. Perhaps precisely because everything around him is in ruins, and it is beyond his power to collect.

I'm not sure that this is the most organic topic for Raikin the actor. But from the performance, first of all, two Raikin scenes remain in my memory. One is in the second act, when the title character literally grows up on the stage from a pile of newspapers and, with the power of his talent, squeezes the audience's attention in his fist, finally uttering a really crazy and obsessive monologue. The second is the finale, in which Lear fussily rushes between the bodies of his daughters, trying to seat each of them directly on stools in front of three pianos. The dead daughters sag and fall, and Lear relentlessly corrects and corrects them one by one until the light is completely extinguished. His dream came true, he became insane. But for this he is deprived of deliverance by death - not immortal, but doomed to the torment of loneliness.

Vedomosti, October 9, 2006

Oleg Zintsov

Leave your horse here

In "Satyricon" they made a performance for growth

On the "King Lear", staged in the "Satyricon" by Yuri Butusov, you have to go in a month or two. It is very possible that then the performance will become shorter and more precise, and a more coherent story will be built around Konstantin Raikin, who plays Lear. So far, the premiere is more like a sketch.

In fact, such reservations are well-founded infrequently. If there is porridge on the stage at the premiere, few people will clear it up afterwards. But the satyricon's "King Lear" teases with hopes for the best.

Now there is a strong and intelligible finale, but you have to get to it through bumps - the St. Petersburg inventor Yuri Butusov, as usual, piled up three boxes of all sorts of tricks, and pulled them together somehow hastily, smartly, but not quite confidently. Butusov loves to entertain the viewer, to make the performance as if he is constantly pulling a rabbit out of his pocket. However, his rabbits now and then strive to scatter, as was the case in Hamlet, which Butusov staged at the Moscow Art Theater last winter - it turned out inventively, but more and more on trifles.

Jokes are jokes, and Butusov and Shakespeare have already had a third duel on the Moscow stage: before “Hamlet” there was Satyricon’s “Richard III”, and if you count Macbeth (Shakespeare, rewritten by the sly bore Ionesco), a tetralogy comes out.

Butusovsky Shakespeare, with bright, colorful scenes-pictures, is adapted not so much for children, but it turns out on a reduced scale; children are always meant. The terrible tragedy of the hunchback Richard, so plastically played by Konstantin Raikin, consisted in the fact that the mother did not love the little freak; evil he did in the cartoon world, where they walk under the table. Macbeth (so far the best of the four performances) was built from huge children's blocks and presented an absurd world of caricatured baddies. In Hamlet, Claudius and the Prince of Denmark bullied each other because they were classmates like Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. And Lear is played according to the principle of “old and small”.

Capricious is the first thing you think offhand about Raikin's Lear, but everything is done, of course, more cunningly. Konstantin Raikin carefully settles in and already colors it, complicates the circumstances invented for him by the director. And yet, in order to demonstrate protest against filial oppression, Lear first pulls down his pants. “You are old. Honorable. They should be a model, ”Goneril (Marina Drovosekova) blames her father and patiently, like a nanny, fastens his fly. Lear does not want to listen to anything, that is, he lowers his trousers again. It is clear that the two eldest daughters - Goneril and Regan (Agrippina Steklova) - are fed up with all this, they no longer want to be puppets, they can't wait to play their game, and it seems that they have already learned adult rules, having passed their father an exam for hypocrisy.

The reluctance to recognize these rules is, according to Butusov, the main thing that distinguishes the characters playing on the side of Lear: the youngest daughter Cordelia (Natalya Vdovina), Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov), Edgar (Artem Osipov) and the faithful vassal of Kent (Timofey Tribuntsev). The last one in the play is constantly beaten by the same butler Oswald (Yakov Lomkin), whom Kent pokes at Shakespeare; his cockiness is not heroic, but childishly comical.

Purely theatrical jokes also look charmingly childish: entering with the question “Where to put the horses?”, Oswald carries over his head a giant and ridiculous (made, it seems, from foil) horse, which is no longer needed for anything, - Butusov’s constant co-author artist Alexander Shishkin thought it up, it seems, just out of mischief.

To describe all the inventions of Butusov and Shishkin, of course, there is no place or need now. And for the time being, until they settle down and order, it would be necessary to postpone the general conclusions. But if everything really converges as it seems from the sketch, it will be possible to start talking about the fact that Yuri Butusov pulled together “Macbeth”, “Richard III”, “Hamlet” and “King Lear” into a single plot, where infantilism turned out to be not only by the quality and manner of the theatrical play, but also by the timely and carefully considered theme.

NG, October 9, 2006

Grigory Zaslavsky

Drag lightly to the coffin

King Lear at the Satyricon Theater

"King Lear", according to the artistic director of the theater Konstantin Raikin, "grew" out of "The Inspector General": they began to rehearse Gogol's comedy and realized that they needed to stage a completely different play. In this regard, it is somehow strange now to listen to the words of Raikin, who opposes in every possible way, when in his "Lear" they were in a hurry to see the actual political meaning and allusions. And even then: why would Raikin play Lear, and Yuri Butusov stage this tragedy, if all of it, with the British and French kings and other dukes, drowned in the past? ..

We will only agree that political allusions are only one side of the coin. Moreover, in the retelling of the performance, the first thing they describe is the ending, such that it immediately throws aside all fantasy tinsel and gives vent to emotions. Lear tries to seat his three daughters at the piano, and the daughters, already dead, fall down, touching the keys. Goneril (Marina Drovosekova) in red, Regan (Agrippina Steklova) in yellow, Cordelia (Natalia Vdovina) in a white dress slide down from their chairs, and the king, unconscious of what is happening, rushes between three pianos and tries to force his daughters to sit down at the instrument. And these random chords mark the atonal music of death.

Butusov and his artist Alexander Shishkin start with a huge table: long building boards are on the goats, with sheets of plywood on them. Around the perimeter of this impromptu table are Lear's daughters, their husbands and suitors. Lear himself (Konstantin Raikin) is on the table. Either - prepared for the posthumous ablution, or - as a festive dish. He himself says: he wants to “weave light to the grave”, while asking his daughters to tell him about their love for him looks like a cruel joke, a crazy whim.

Perhaps this should be considered Butusov’s main theatrical discovery: Lear in his performance is truly insane at the beginning: to keep the crown and royal title, distributing the kingdom to the heirs, or rather, to their husbands, in short, to third parties - is this not madness? At least from the point of view of history, applying all this to the medieval laws of Europe, at least from the current one, trying to imagine how it can turn out in 2008, when our president is planning a peaceful transfer of presidential power to a hypothetical successor...

There are no direct political parallels in the play, however, the characters do not go deep into history either: the costumes are not related to any particular era, but in general they “float” within the 20th century. The remnants of overcoats, of an indefinite military uniform, on Lear's head, instead of a crown, is a tight-fitting black cap - some go to pray in the mosque in such, others - put on under wide-brimmed Hasidic hats.

Well, Lear's madness is not at all like a disease. Everything is pronounced by Raikin quite meaningfully, his eyes are clear. Left alone, accompanied by a jester (Elena Bereznova) and Kent (Timofey Tribuntsev), in only “long-brimmed” shorts, he is frighteningly normal amid the madness of bad weather and family breakdown. By the way, this is how Shakespeare puts it (and here Butusov follows the author), the breakup of the family in this case quite obviously leads to the breakup of the country, internecine wars and even external intervention (Cordelia brings French troops with her). But such is the tragedy: no one cares about the country and the people.

Butusov is ruthless to actors: Edgar (Artem Osipov), when he is supposed to portray madness, makes him pour a bucket of some kind of paste on his head in front of the audience and then fall out in this sticky rubbish. Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov) is executed by sticking his face into a tub of torn papers, others are doused with water from head to toe ... It's a strange thing: the more stage tricks, the more impressive a simple but real - passionate - game. Pairing with what is happening on the stage arises only when Natalya Vdovina - Cordelia enters the conversation. Once discovered by Raikin, her tragic temperament here finally finds a natural outlet. And Raikin himself likes tragedy. Everything else seems superfluous.

RG, October 9, 2006

Irina Korneeva

stage of the theater of the absurd

Konstantin Raikin played King Lear

The premiere of "King Lear" directed by Yuri Butusov, who has been associated with the "Satyricon" for years of successful and serious work ("Macbeth" by Ionesco, Shakespeare's "Richard III"), was especially expected in Moscow - this performance was one of the last to open the theater's new season.

In this tragedy in the Satyricon, several essentially conflicting translations - Pasternak, Druzhinin and Ketcher - were reduced to a single denominator. And in this role, to which, like a fantastic block, they approach all their lives, taking in more air into their lungs and still suffocating at the very first steps towards it, Konstantin Raikin appeared.

And the new king Lear began to divide his state according to the colorful declarations of his daughters in love for him. The plot here was approached as a time bomb. At first, quietly, without forcing events and as if assuring the viewer: everything is calm, everything is fine, this time they will not make Ionesco from Shakespeare - they will lull vigilance. And then, when the audience completely calms down and relaxes, and even stops noticing Alexander Shishkin’s artistic and scenographic logging on stage, without being distracted by how the actors pull bare boards and without thinking about how many splinters they plant in their hands, give such a crescendo of passions, as if they were not speaking words, but tearing them out of their throats.

Here is the blinded Earl of Gloucester - Denis Sukhanov, mad with grief, is trying to commit suicide. And the hall, as before in a stereo movie, leans forward in order to have time to give him hands, support him and prevent him from falling off a fictional cliff.

Here is Regan - Agrippina Steklova - beaten by her beloved husband, deceived by a passionate lover and poisoned by her own sister, writhing in her death throes - and everyone around is ready to forgive her her daughter's sins and urgently run to come up with an antidote.

Here Edmond, the illegitimate son of Gloucester, performed by Maxim Averin, who became not just an evil notorious person, but a real fiend, grows from a hunted boy, clinging to his father’s feet like a dog, into a monster offended by the whole world and taking revenge on everyone. And it hurts to look at him.

Here is Count Kent - Timofey Tribuntsev, faithfully serving his king, endures beatings, at the most advantageous moments reaching such heights of tragedy that do not abound even in the life of King Lear himself ...

Here Cordelia, with the help of Natalya Vdovina, turned into a completely resigned shy woman, sheds tears visible to the world, and in the hall in unison they climb for her handkerchiefs, taking the realities of her life as close to heart as their own ...

Finally, King Lear - Konstantin Raikin in all his splendor - finds the shortest and surest way to the viewer's heart - through incredible humor and human charm that breaks through all Shakespearean armor, achieving incredible compassion. The scenes in the play, when, watching his strong, cheerful, energetic, but already beginning to fall into childhood Lear, you don’t know what to do - cry or laugh - are the best scenes. After all, the madness of his Lear is not a pretentious melodies with wringing his hands, screaming to the beat and pulling out his hair on his head, but a very convincing, one must even say, everyday madness. And his outbursts of anger are not invented, nurtured and put on koturny reactions, but quite understandable and explainable sparks of the inevitable age-related senile irritability.

And yet, director Yuri Butusov is a master of productions from the territory of the theater of the absurd. Beckett, Peter, Buechner, Ionesco - it seems that in his theatrical life these are the same real characters as a neighbor from above, or a tired seller of the nearest store, or a tram driver who takes you to work every day. But I mean that the heroes of Shakespeare, already almost "domesticated" by theaters, in Yuri Butusov, willy-nilly or not, move into the plane of the absurd, climbing there, as if into a saving world, clinging to it with all their might and almost reconciling there with all the horrors, around them in reality. Judge for yourself: the situation is absurd, the behavior of people is absurd, the motivations of their actions are absurd, their cruelty and greed are absurd and self-destructive. Absurd later insights and desperate repentance, absurd are the attempts to both love and hate, equally leading to death - with a blissful or distorted face with rage. And what is paradoxical: they do not play the theater of the absurd at all. They are there, just like we are here, they have been living in it for a long time.

Izvestia, October 9, 2006

Marina Davydova

Non-lyrical digression

For a great play, you can pick up different theatrical keys. Sometimes you have to use lockpicks. As a last resort (barbaric method), the treasured chest can be simply cracked open. Yuri Butusov, who staged "King Lear" in "Satyricon" with Konstantin Raikin in the title role, seems to have no keys, no master keys, no crowbar in his hands. He didn't even try to open the box. He just painted it spectacularly.

Shortly before Butusov, Kirill Serebrennikov turned to Shakespeare (he staged Antony and Cleopatra in Sovremennik). A little earlier - last season - Lev Dodin (he also staged "Lear"). For all the disproportionateness of these productions (the performance of the master - albeit not the best of him - rises above the performances of the representatives of the new generation of our direction, like a hill above the bumps), I - in the case of Dodin, and in the case of Serebrennikov - clearly understand what they were animated. Dodin studied Shakespeare's characters as psychological phenomena, Serebrennikov as social ones. Serebrennikov was much less interested in the great love story than today's story. He was occupied with the monstrous civilizational rift between the West and the East, and he was so carried away by concretizing the place and time of the action that he forgot or failed to saturate this chronotope with living human feelings. In Dodin, the place and time of the action were, on the contrary, extremely abstracted. But the relationship of the characters he built filigree. It was not the tragedy of one person, but the tragedy of a disintegrating family. Chekhov's motifs were persistently woven into the melody of Shakespeare's play. Three daughters... Three sisters...

In Butusov's Lira there is neither a clear social message nor an answer to the questions of where and when the action takes place. But there are no psychological motivations in it either. The efforts of a talented troupe (and even in this performance it is clear that Raikin's troupe has a fair amount of talent) sometimes give rise to some meanings. Or maybe, you think with hope, this is about how not bad, in essence, people are suddenly possessed by demonic forces: Butusov’s Gaer talent is prone to such infernalism, and - oh, how well Agrippina Steklova suddenly conveyed the witch nature of her Regan with one glance. But no. It doesn't seem to be about that. Or maybe then ... Yes, it seems, too. The heroes of the performance, like the heroes of Pirandello, vainly wander around the stage in search of a concept that can somehow frame their violent passions and amazing deeds.

In another satirical play by Butusov based on Shakespeare - "Richard III", as well as in his play "Macbeth" based on Ionesco, the main bearer of stage meaning was the cartoonish charming infantilism of the stage environment (artist Alexander Shishkin). Here Shishkin is also present. But if the chronicle of Shakespeare and the play of the famous absurdist can, if desired, be presented as a cartoon "sitcom" in which volumes, Jerry and Mickey Mouse, who fell into the snares of classical literature, drove each other to death seriously, then the tragedy "King Lear" requires a different level of comprehension . Butusov has no comprehension, there are separate notions that are not connected with each other - "vignettes of a false essence," as the pompous songwriter Larisa Rubalskaya would write.

In the second act, Raikin can't stand it. He reins in his acting organics and suddenly plays one scene almost brilliantly, so that the audience, which until then lazily lounging in its chairs, in a single impulse moves to the edge of the seat. This is the scene of Lear's madness. Logical and genre shifts, differences from high truths to unpretentious absurdity, from a tragic grimace to a clown's antics succeed Raikin perfectly. In his very last name, I hear something from the word "raek". Let Raek applaud the actor! And here it is possible for theater-goers, as well as music lovers, to advise: spit on the first act, come to the second, sleep a little at the very beginning, but then you will see this ... Then again you can sleep a little. Until the final.

In the final, Yuri Butusov comes up with a wonderful scene. Lear does not die. He, like Sisyphus, forever rolling his stone up the mountain, is forced to eternally resurrect dead children. He puts them on the swivel chairs, but they, frozen for a moment (reviving?), again and again fall lifeless to the ground. Bravo! Simply - bravo! But God... I didn't even know if he loved his daughters. Dodin made it clear. Loved, loved very much. And most importantly, they loved him. Behind the relationship of this Lear and these daughters, the relationship of Dodin himself with his artists was clearly traced, and the monstrous alienation of people who were really close to each other was terrible. Here it is just funny. Here, Lear's tragedy remained a secret sealed with seven seals. Here, even the amazingly invented ending is just another pattern drawn on a chest that has never been opened.

	Photo ITAR-TASS

Newspaper .Ru, October 9, 2006

Dina Goder

King's new kippah

The premiere of "King Lear" in "Satyricon" with Raikin in the role of a mad monarch was deafening with music, running around and Lear, who looked like a Hasid.

When they talk about Yuri Butusov, they always start from the stove: they say, he graduated from the theater institute in St. Petersburg along with an excellent acting team - Khabensky, Trukhin, Porechenkov and artist Alexander Shishkin, this whole company came to the Leningrad City Council Theater and made performances there, around which crowds swirled fans. When the actors parted on the series, Butusov stopped working in the theater for a while, but then everyone began to appear in Moscow one by one: the actors came to work at the Moscow Art Theater one by one, and Butusov, together with Shishkin, began to be invited to the productions of Satyricon. Last season, the old St. Petersburg story ended at the Moscow Art Theater with “Hamlet”: Butusov staged a play about former friends, where Trukhin-Hamlet, Khabensky-Claudius and Porechenkov-Polonius looked like peers who were no longer connected by anything except old memories.

Everything has changed, and now Butusov is also completely different from the one who staged nervous, "acting" performances in St. Petersburg.

Now, for his productions, full of loud music and movement, the artist is much more important than the actors, and each of his performances is remembered, first of all, as a series of spectacular pictures. They scroll before your eyes beautifully and senselessly, like gears idling, until one of them, almost by accident, suddenly hooks the other towards the finale. And then, looking back, it seems that everything that happened made sense.

It seems that this time Butusov began to stage The Inspector General in the Satyricon and Raikin was supposed to be the Governor. But the director suddenly changed his mind, instead of Gogol's comedy he began to make King Lear and Raikin was offered the title role. Before the premiere, everyone judged and rowed, discussing this unexpected choice, but, recalling Butusov’s paradoxical “Richard III”, where Raikin, as a usurper king, helplessly, like a child, sat on a huge chair and dangled his legs, they expected that the actor would this time will not let you down.

"King Lear" can be described in the same words as Butusov's previous Moscow productions - a series of spectacular and inexplicable decisions, thundering music, running around and dancing.

The performance begins with the scene of the division of the kingdom: Lear lies on the table, as if on a deathbed, around which the household gathered, and a card indicating the share of each of the daughters covers him like a blanket. Here are the daughters themselves: Goneril (Marina Drovosekova) in a scarlet dress, Regan (Agrippina Steklova) in yellow and Cordelia (Natalia Vdovina) in white. It's spectacular. Here, when the central door opens, behind it you can see the huge puppet face of some kind of oriental mask. Beautiful. Here are three broken pianos. Here is a jester - for some reason he is played by a young actress with a whitened face (Elena Bereznova). She runs around in her underwear and next to the vital youthful Lear resembles the field wife of General Charnota. Here is the Earl of Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov), looking somewhat younger than his illegitimate son, Edmond (Maxim Averin). For some reason, they go out together along the path, and then the Duke of Cornwall (Konstantin Tretyakov) joins them with a broom. Here Gloucester jumps up on the lid of the piano, but he sorts through his "paws", twists his head and shouts, which is clear: this is not Gloucester, but a parrot.

At the very beginning, when Lear is just dividing the kingdom, this brutal, springy black-bearded man in a knitted hat with an instant rage against anyone who contradicts him seems to be a fighter of the Transcaucasian type: don’t come close - he will kill. Then accuracy and recognition disappear somewhere, and a formal muscular effort remains. Even Lear's main monologue in the steppe in the midst of a storm: “Blow, wind, blow…” turns out to be just a competition to see who will out-shout whom: the actor playing the thundering music or she playing him.

And suddenly - it happens. It’s not that everything on the stage has changed dramatically, it’s just that with a good actor it’s never known why something suddenly clicks in him, as if a light bulb has lit up, and what was painful to look at before will instantly take on meaning and won’t let go.

Mad Lear enters the stage in family shorts and some kind of towel, twisted around his head like a wreath. He sits down next to the blinded Gloucester and Edgar and speaks softly but can be heard. He is bitterly mocking, has no hopes, no self-pity, he seems thin, pitiful, and suddenly at some point shakes his head so recognizably and mournfully that he turns into an old impoverished Jew who has lost his children. He has a grizzled beard, huge black eyes and a devout Hasidic intonation, where prayer is mixed with anger, and pathos is inseparable from irony.

This, of course, is all just speculation and conjecture. One saw something Biblical in the way Lear clasped his hands, in his burning black eyes, and the other did not. And in general, the theater is a living thing, maybe next time a completely different scene will be played by the actor as the main one, and will cast a different light on the indistinct director's heap.

This time, Raikin finished the performance just as formally as he played most of it, but you will not forget about this scene. And in the finale, when Lear will again and again seat his dead daughters in bright dresses on the chairs at the piano, and they will fall musically on the keys, and then slide beautifully to the floor ... Even in this scene, made like a “sure thing”, looking at how fussy and ugly Lear runs between his beautiful dead girls, you will remember how he shook his head and stuffed the beggar's bowler hat like a pile.

Newstime, October 10, 2006

Anna Gordeeva

Dead daughters

Yuri Butusov staged "King Lear" in "Satyricon"

Two people are standing in the forefront, putting their feet on the third - the Earl of Kent (Timofey Tribuntsev) and the Earl of Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov) are discussing the upcoming division of the kingdom. The Earl of Gloucester also speaks of his own illegitimate son - this son, in the role of a stand for the boots of noble gentlemen. So, from the very first scene, we are presented with the method by which director Yuri Butusov reads King Lear: what is drawn in ink or pencil in the text is indicated in gouache in the performance. Thick, almost clown paint.

Edmond is certainly humiliated in this scene and in the play - his mother is spoken of very disrespectfully in his presence; in the play, this humiliation is expressed in a pose: Edmond is on all fours. In the next scene (and this is precisely the division of the kingdom), Lear (Konstantin Raikin), speaking of the desire to give up power and “weave light to the coffin”, is already lying on the table, like a dead man. And if, after abdicating power, he himself, his retinue, his habit of not knowing refusal in anything terribly annoys Goneril, in whose castle he is staying, because she believes that people around Lear behave obscenely - then here you are: with a roar "I am a king!" Lear will lower his pants - she will have to raise them, grimacing, on her absurd father.

The story of Lear for Butusov is apparently the story of old age, and Konstantin Raikin does not play decrepitude, but the transition from an elderly person to an old man. His Lear is preoccupied with his own greatness, which certainly was not the case when he was really great. He didn't need words before - but now he does; and Cordelia suffers because she did not notice it in time. He stamps his foot - before, apparently, the rumble was going through the palace, now only the boards are shaking. He stretches his neck menacingly - and becomes like some mangy bird. All this is juicy, picturesque and rude.

If Edmond (Maxim Averin) utters hymns to nature, he will be nature itself - just an animal, biting into a piece of bread, like a dog into a bone. And if Edgar (Artem Osipov), posing as a madman, should inspire both horror and cautious disgust - at the behest of the director, the actor fearlessly pours a large can of glue on his head, this thing flows over his shoulders, back, chest - and then the actor falls to the ground and makes a few turns (almost a break dance) on the torn newspapers. Some of their pieces remain hanging on it.

Recalling the arguments of Shakespeare scholars that, perhaps, the same actor played the jester and Cordelia in Shakespeare's time (since these characters never meet on stage), Butusov, no, does not combine roles, but gives the role of the jester to the actress (Elena Bereznova). This is perhaps the most controversial move of the performance - it is not very clear why this was done. Only now to play with Shakespearean studies - “there men played women, but in my case a woman will play a man”? But the jester should feel the power - not stupid, not animal in any case, but the subtle power of rightness and fidelity, sending him after the homeless sovereign. Here, a girl in a velvet, or something, black mini performs only a decorative function. But Butusov offers a solution to the Shakespearean problem - where did the jester go after the scene of the storm? (The author simply does not appear anymore, that's all). So, at Butusov’s, Lear, completely crazy, simply strangled the jester and left the body to lie.

In this performance, which follows from one bright scene to another (and in each scene there is only one color, one effect), there can be no details that break the monochrome, and the butler Oswald (played by Yakov Lomkin, and the character is created absolutely disgusting - a kind of mixture of mannered stylist and impudent executioner) the last request is denied: already dying, he does not beg to deliver the letter of the lady entrusted to him, the bastards cannot think at such an hour not only about themselves. And yet, such a performance does not require "solid" scenery: it would be inorganic.

Set designer Alexander Shishkin set up a massive door at the back of the stage, with a washstand to the left of it, and three pianos in a row to the right. When the door opens, you can periodically see the huge face of some Asian girl, as if looking through this door. Dollhouse? East, dispassionately watching the throwing of the West? The scene of the duel between Edgar and Edmond, who paint their faces white and turn into Japanese dolls, also works for this version. But the last scene, when Lear tries to seat all three of his dead daughters at the piano - and they slide over the keys and fall off their chairs again and again - suggests that the performance is still about the West, not about the East. The vanity of human efforts in Asia is still treated less desperately, more philosophically.

Newspaper, October 10, 2006

Gleb Sitkovsky

Who needs him, this Lear?

Yuri Butusov staged Shakespeare's tragedy in "Satyricon"

In Shakespeare's time, the London Globe, as you know, had almost no scenery. In order for the audience to somehow orient themselves, a sign with the designation of the place of action was simply taken out onto the stage. In Yury Butusov's play King Lear, there is also a similar plaque stuck in the middle of the Satyricon stage, but, alas, there is not a word on it. The suspicion creeps in that the director got lost. Butusov, apparently, did not know not only the habitat of the characters, but also the very purpose of the performance.

The goal, in fact, was only one: to create a favorable environment for the wonderful actor Konstantin Raikin, whose creative biography will now be replenished with another Shakespearean role. Raikin once played Hamlet on this stage in a play by the outstanding Georgian (yes, Georgian!) director Robert Sturua. A few seasons ago, with the help of Butusov, not without brilliance, he got used to the role of the great villain Richard III, and now it was Raikin's turn to play the most unfortunate of kings.

What can you say about this Lyra? Unfortunately, this role did not work out to fit into the line of legendary performers. All that the great actor Konstantin Raikin can be proud of here is the monologue in the second act, plus a few more successful cries and lively intonations. The storm scene is such a failure. To put it even more sharply, there is no Lear in this performance. You simply cannot describe the British king here in any words. You can’t call him either a great sufferer, or some special capricious person, or a little-minded, or a righteous man. A little bit of everything. The arithmetic mean of all previous Lears that have ever existed on the dramatic stage. The retinue in this performance, all the more, does not play the king - nothing more than an anguish of the vocal cords and a general revival of the rutiners, from the actors until the very end you can’t wait.

Both director Butusov and artist Alexander Shishkin are happy to follow the principle of "a little bit of everything". The scenery is taken as if "from the selection." In the depths, it is not known for what purpose an unnoticed mask of a Japanese god hangs. Here we will set up an engraving depicting a Renaissance fountain, next to it - some other engraving so that the place is not empty, and over there we will put three pianos at a distance. And is it really so important that for three and a half hours these tools will mostly be lonely idle? Don't pick on. After all, they will be needed for the finale, when the lifeless bodies of Goneril, Regan and Cordelia will again and again disharmoniously flop onto the piano keyboards, and the sobbing father, trying to restore the lost harmony, will again and again seat his daughters on spinning chairs. This will vaguely recall how Hamlet's father in the great play by Eymuntas Nyakroshyus, with an animal roar, tried to unclench the crooked fingers of his dead son, grabbing the drum. In general, the ending is not exactly stolen from Nyakroshus, but you can call it original. There it is dictated by the logic of action, but here it is nothing. It's just an idea.

Director's inventions and actor's intonations for the most part are also taken "from the selection". Here Lear publicly lowered his pants in protest against the child's arbitrariness, and you immediately recall the same Nyakroshyus' Hamlet. Here the feuding daughters begin to gently hug each other - know that this is borrowed from Lev Dodin's King Lear, which was released only six months ago. Yuri Butusov either skillfully hid his own thoughts about the great play, or did not have it at all. He created in the "Satyricon" a variant of an instant performance, using everything that came to hand and imitating genuine feelings. But only who needs him, such Lear? Neither mind nor heart.

Culture, October 12, 2006

Irina Alpatova

Sins of creators and children

"King Lear" by W. Shakespeare. Satyricon Theater

It seems that the director Yuri Butusov has not yet departed from the not so long ago production of "Hamlet" at the Moscow Art Theater. Or maybe Shakespeare's plays, which he has been stubbornly and successfully staging lately, have converged for him on a single and indivisible territory. And in each new performance, echoes of the motives of the former ones, which have become common motives, are heard.

"The century is dislocated" - so it was in "Hamlet". In the satyricon's "King Lear" the eyelid does not just "dislocate the joint", it beats in an epileptic fit. And at the same time a paradoxical feeling: what if this is just a splash of violent acting and directing energy? Such a desperate dance on the bones of a collapsed century, and a theater, and a house. Here everything and everyone was blown away - literally and figuratively. The floor was broken, the walls were ripped off. Ruins, fragments - the ground heaved up underfoot, so similar to cracked asphalt. It is not known where the lonely red door leads. Next to it are two more pictures, like fragments of decorations from previous performances of the former theatre. A long table on a trestle, covered with pieces of cardboard and plywood sheets (scenography by Alexander Shishkin). All this will move apart, fall, be pulled apart, then from these cardboard-plywood scraps the characters with maniacal persistence will begin to build at least some kind of shelter for themselves.

Butusov does not pretend to be a true reading of the classics, this has long been known to everyone. However, the classics do not disfigure with modern "versions", they only combine the translations of different intonations by B. Pasternak, N. Druzhinin and N. Ketcher and slightly stop the most voluminous texts. True, it does not pretend to be a strictly verified "concept" graphics either. Not before her. It is too early to build anything, now the main thing is to crawl out from under the rubble and try to survive. At least at the cost of losing your mind. "God forbid I go crazy" - this is not a call for the characters of Butusov's performance. And most importantly - not for King Lear (Konstantin Raikin), who is not even a king at all. Just a man who, it seems, inadvertently pulled out the last link from the shaky structure of the universe. Go get it now...

Butusov starts a game without rules, borders, times and nations. On the Satyricon stage, everything that survived was mixed up in a heap. The aforementioned decorative door can open into the front door of St. Petersburg. Nearby - some kind of Italian landscape with a fountain, even more to the left - a painted corner of an old cozy living room. Behind the open door, the enlarged face of either a Japanese or a Chinese child appears. Lear - Raikin will put on some kind of parody of a boyar fur coat. Edgar (Artem Osipov) will find somewhere Pierrot's suit with long, floor-length sleeves. Count Kent (Timofey Tribuntsev) will put on a crimson lackey uniform. Edmond (Maxim Averin) and Edgar will smear their faces with white clay, creating a semblance of a Japanese theater mask. Everything goes into action, as in the last performance of the last theatre.

"Nothing will come of nothing" - this is already a quote from Lear. But Butusov is just trying to create something out of nothing. About what, I mean, something? About everything. Butusov is already quite experienced, but still quite young and adventurous. And therefore, going to the start, he imagines where the finish line is, but he does not know the direct and short road to it. And he doesn't want to know. He wants to find it himself, sometimes running far away from the intended route, arranging a picnic-parking there, and again - to the finish line. He is not interested in the clarity of lines, he prefers zigzags. And probably, the theater for him is not a "work" in the original sense of the word, but above all a game.

So he once again does not "set" Shakespeare, but he plays with him. Carrying along artists, including the venerable and eminent artistic director of Satyricon Konstantin Raikin, who, obediently or not, I don’t know, but agrees to this game. Much wins, something loses, not without it. But the ensemble (and it certainly exists - a kind of ensemble chaos) does not destroy, does not pull the blanket over itself. Although, of course, it remains the center of attraction of the audience's attention.

There are a lot of jokes and gags in this director's game, almost circus tricks. But it was precisely from the clowning that the now famous Butusov performance "Waiting for Godot" once grew. They are sometimes optional, seem either improvisational or, on the contrary, carefully thought out. But in the total game, they are by no means annoying. Here Oswald (Yakov Lomkin) drags a massive skeleton of a fake horse on his shoulders and immediately asks in Shakespeare's text: "Where to put the horses here?" - after which he carefully puts his funny load on the stage. Kent-Tribunsky is not shackled in stocks, but placed in a box from the circus attraction "Cut the Woman": his bare leg sticks out ridiculously, his head sticks out ridiculously. Here Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov), like Petrushka or Punch, jumps out from behind an old piano with a cock's crow. Here, ready for madness, Lear - Raikin in shorts and a wreath on his head crosses the stage with huge jumps. And try to ask: "Why?" Well people are playing. And in any performance, it is occasionally necessary to defuse the situation and the atmosphere, to release "steam".

However, Butusov, right up to the very end, does not insist on tragedy. The purity of the genre is not his element. Moreover, his theater is directly connected with today's life, where we sometimes flounder among the same ruins of everything that exists, like Shakespeare's characters, not knowing what is more appropriate - to cry or laugh. Not knowing where any reckless random act can lead. Well, as in the case of the same king, who is not even a king at all.

Lear - Raikin is reclining on a huge, rudely made table - either he is really preparing to die, or he is just playing the fool. He is covered with a colorful blanket, which turns out to be a map of the state, and on it he measures out which of the daughters which "piece to throw away." And nothing to you senile, heroic, all the more grandiloquent. He briskly jumped to his feet, demonstrating the most simple attire - a white sweatshirt, shabby pants, a black knitted hat pulled down over his eyes. And the action immediately rushes forward - in a frantic, galloping rhythm.

Before one scene has time to recoup, as right there, jumping on the previous one, the next one is started - on the left, on the right, behind. And so it will be until the very culmination, until the "storm", until the moment when the hero has to realize: something is wrong in our kingdom. And immediately loosen the fetters that bind the spirit and the body, since "setting the joint" for Lear is an impossible task.

This is probably the strangest role of Konstantin Raikin, who has long been on friendly terms with Shakespeare. He himself staged "Romeo and Juliet", he himself played Richard III and Hamlet. But even Richard, created in collaboration with the same Butusov, not to mention Hamlet, was more definite, aware of the causes and consequences of impulses and passions. But this Lear is not a completely adequate creature, and it is, of course, difficult for Raikin to play a character without an obvious inner core. But in the life of even a very experienced artist there is always a place for something new. And Raikin follows Butusov into unfamiliar theater territory, not knowing where he will end up.

Raikin's lir is elusive and inexplicable. In this dynamic performance, it seems impossible to take a freeze frame and analyze the state of the protagonist. With rare exceptions. Lir Raikin can be a despot, a capricious old man and a child who is allowed everything and who does not know what he is doing. He literally illustrates his daughter's words about the annoying "buffoonery" - he takes off his pants and freezes with a satisfied look, just like an unreasonable child who knows that he can get away with everything. Not understanding the essence of what is happening, he will begin to accuse everyone around of sins and vices. In a fit of some sweet rage, he will strangle the Jester (Elena Bereznova) to death, and strangle him in his arms. And only once there will be a passionate and sincere monologue in the hall, as they say, "on the rupture of the aorta" - in the scene of a storm, when, throwing newspapers flying in the face, Lear and Raikin become one, a person with powerful, desperate energy .. But, as already mentioned, this did not lead to anyone's insight or salvation here.

However, Butusov, writing his total game, hardly set these global goals. He did not look for right and wrong, did not pass sentences, did not analyze anything and did not draw far-reaching conclusions. Although one motive can still be heard in this cosmopolitan noise and chaos. Or, if you like, fantasize about what you heard. The motive of fathers and children, their common sins, multiplied by the sins of the creators, including this performance. Unconscious sins, committed casually, which there is no strength, or even desire to realize. "What a wonderful game" unfolded on the Satyricon stage, and how many corpses were thrown to the surface by the playing elements. And three dead girls, Goneril (Marina Drovosekova), Regan (Agrippina Steklova) and Cordelia (Natalia Vdovina), whom the distraught father keeps seating on wobbly chairs in front of the piano. And they slide down one after another, touching the keys, for the first time emitting truly tragic, elemental chords. Hats off to this ending. For a lump in the throat, for a skipping heart. But is everything in this life a game - that is the question.

MN, October 13, 2006

Natalya Kazmina

Lear did something stupid

Shakespeare re-read and re-read at the Satyricon Theatre.

Konstantin Raikin loves the audience, but does not make this a cult. He taught her to go to the "Satyricon", but continues to run the distance. And he did not leave the habit inside the public theater to allow himself the art theater, begun by Pyotr Fomenko and Robert Sturua. Yuri Butusov with his Shakespearean performances (Richard and Lira would like to be called a diptych) in this company.

"Lear" is one of those few Moscow performances that you need to return to. There is a lot to be said about him. At the same time, it quite clearly combines "the theater is not for everyone" and "the theater for everyone." Without simplifying Shakespearean meanings and offering the viewer (and the actor) a rather complex metaphorical structure, Butusov knows how to tell a story. There are a lot of associations in it, so the intellectual, alas, who knows how the story will end, will have something to do. Not to mention the viewer who will hear the story for the first time. Even 20 years ago, the perception of Lear as a noble tragedy was destroyed by Sturua, who saw in it a story of retribution. Butusov exists, it seems to me, in the same vein, but he makes his own discoveries.

In a nutshell, he sets the story of human stupidity. "Lear has done something stupid!" - Lir Raikin exclaims almost comically, barely having time to divide the kingdom between his daughters. "And this is a man?" - he throws up his hands in the final. Between these remarks lies Lear's journey from stupidity to wisdom. Butusov is clearly more important than Lear's suffering - and compassion for him - the analysis of the discovery of the world, which comes to the old man before the very grave.

This is the story of one insight, I would say, if I were not afraid to fall into pathos (you don’t believe him for a long time). And Butusov is afraid to fall into pathos, so his "Lir" is texturally rude and at first seems defiantly simple. It combines three translations - Druzhinin, Ketcher and Pasternak, two poetic and one prose, two early and one great, two little known and therefore sounding fresh, and one painfully familiar. The gap is not visible, and it is clear why they are together. The beauties of Butusov's style are extremely hidden, the romantic Pasternak is "heard" only in the monologues of the mad Lear: the madman has the right to speak in verse. For the rest, this "Lear" seems to be prose. Prose of life. And life is rough.

Pure colors reign in this "peasant" kingdom (artist A. Shishkin). Against the background of the tree, the dresses of the three Lira daughters look like bright spots: red - the warriors Goneril (M. Drovosekova), yellow - the silly Regan (A. Steklova) and white - the girls Cordelia (N. Vdovina). This kingdom has no breed. There is no wealth either. The table is on the goats, they are saved from the rain under a cardboard box. The door does not lead anywhere: they go through the door, but this kingdom has no walls. There is nothing much to share here. Here the dispute is not about wealth, although everyone is rushing somewhere upstairs. There is a metaphysical dispute going on here.

History is played on the ruins of the world. And on the ruins of culture. As if on a clock, there are three canvases by the door, three fragments of style. The paintings are clearly in need of restoration. Like the rest of the kingdom. By the end, they will be bare frames, and from the kingdom - and stone on stone. The stage will be covered with old newspapers. And for business, taking brooms, cleaners will be accepted. Both the enemies and the supporters of Lear will line up. A wave of a broom - and there is no Lear on earth. "Woe to those who repent, but it's too late," says Gloucester (M. Sukhanov), whose story of him and his two sons, Edmond (M. Averin) and Edgar (A. Osipov), echoes the drama of Lear. To be able to see, you have to go blind, like Gloucester. Or, like Lear, to lose everything in order to become human again. Wisdom is acquired by touch. "Old man", "old age" - these words in the play were not so conspicuous before. But for Raikin, who plays the most entertaining old man, this is important.

Sturdy, gray-haired, with a curly beard, in a black cap, which he calls a crown, this Lear (probably a good warrior) is to divide the kingdom in the likeness of a cuirass and old trousers with hairpins. At home. The first scene in the tragedy is the most important. How and why you share, so then you will play. Lear Raikin reclines on the table, covering himself, like a blanket, with a map of his possessions. "I have reached the highest power," he could repeat after another literary hero. His desire to hear how daughters love their father is an old man's whim. He has many quirks. He might throw his fists at Cordelia, who refused to speak, he might take off his pants in front of Goneril, who had offended him, and sulk while she puts him back on. Lir Raikin is extravagant, but no more than other old men. He is not stupid, but trusting. Like all strong people, he likes to surround himself with weaklings. Like all strong people, sooner or later one ceases to feel sorry for weakness and to distinguish eloquence from flattery. To rage when he is rebuffed, like an honest Kent (T. Tribuntsev). Raikin's lir is simple-hearted, but seduced by the view from the top, by the delusion that the world works this way and not otherwise, for centuries. He is deceived by the peace of greatness, which he took seriously. Here one must not miss the glance of Lear-Raikin, who for the first time realizes that he has been deceived. It has such a childish wonder about it. It is at this moment that a man is born in the king.

"Nothing will come of nothing," Lear chuckles as he disinherits Cordelia. But Raikin and Butusov tell a story about how "out of nothing" (whims, conceit, squabbles) in the end nothing comes out - the world is collapsing. Lear did something stupid and bit the bit. Lear himself started the mechanism of this chain reaction. And then: Then Lear goes merrily crazy, and the world continues to crumble, deceit devours those who started it. Clutching each other's hair, the sisters, Goneril and Regan, roll on the floor. Brother goes with a knife on brother. And even the mad Lear himself - in the enlightenment of the mind! - suddenly remember that he was a king, and say a terrible: "And then on the sons-in-law - and beat without regret." The world, even collapsing, seems incorrigible.

Madness Raikin really plays fun, but it is here that you can hear the tragedy, see the actor of the tragedy. Lear's thought jumps from subject to subject, each time stumbling over an absurd refrain: "Password? - Fragrant marjoram. - Come in." He himself jumps like a touching little sparrow, a half-naked old man who has rejected "the crown, life and the queen." Under the banner of Lear the jester, only jesters stand up, those who have nothing to lose: Kent, Edgar, Jester. (Here is the director’s only blunder. One of the mysteries of Lear, the Jester, who comes from nowhere and disappears into nowhere, was not solved by Butusov. Perhaps because the jester king no longer needs the Jester? Butusov’s Jester is played by a woman, and this suggests to the idea that next to Kent in disguise and Edgar in disguise in his retinue could be Cordelia in disguise Shakespearean tradition knows this too.

One of the most powerful semantic scenes of the performance is when the captive Lear calls the newly found Cordelia to prison: "The plague will devour them before we begin to cry for them." The old man and the maiden go off into death, laughing. This is, according to Butusov, the taste of freedom.

Perhaps the director here can be called a misanthrope. The world, knowing itself through suffering, and the world stepping on the same rake, terrifies him. “We are to the gods what flies are to the boys,” Gloucester laments, and the director embodies this idea in a metaphor. The illusion is as strong as in his "Richard", where people and things seemed to change scale during the performance: the world-theater seemed to be bigger and bigger, and there were less and less people, people-dolls in it. The sparrow lyre seems already quite tiny.

However, towards the end, this apocalyptic worldview lets go of the director, just as Lear lets go of revenge and the desire to "return everything." The wisdom bestowed on the old man is also the director's choice: "There is no one to blame in the world. Everyone is right. I will stand up for everyone." The finale, invented by Butusov for the tragic actor Raikin, is epic and incredibly tender. The picture of the old man's eternal torment, this Sisyphean labor - to see dead daughters and try to revive them - is composed very talentedly.

In one of the scenes, when the doors are thrown open, you suddenly notice a giant fragment of someone's sad face in the opening. At times it looks doll-like, but at other times it seems to be part of a larger picture. Maybe it's the eyes of God. Or maybe God is already dead...

Evening Moscow, October 9, 2006

Olga Fuchs

The king swaggered to the last

Konstantin Raikin played King Lear in the play by Yuri Butusov

In fact, Yuri Butusov was invited to stage The Inspector General. But after one of the table rehearsals, Butusov and Raikin, as if by the way, announced to the theatrical “households”: “But we changed the name. There will be King Lear.” After the premiere, it becomes clear why the director could not think of anything else.

Butusov placed Shakespeare's tragedy in an unobtrusively marked environment of an ingenuous and merciless circus. Uniformists will roll out the red carpet of the arena, and the tragedy of the "naked man on bare ground" - the arena - will emerge with frightening directness. Here, a direct spotlight beam will become a storm, mercilessly hitting your face and illuminating you to the end.

Here the Jester will die, disappearing into nowhere in Shakespeare (a reckless and devoted travesty girl performed by Elena Bereznova): Lear will hug his Jester too much - let him not suffer anymore, do not see new troubles, let him fall asleep, because in this rough arena they will no longer pass his sad jokes. And friends will shudder - The King is insane.

Konstantin Raikin plays the tragedy of the emerging collapse. You succumb to the hypnosis of his brilliant eccentricity, reassuring yourself that this is just a game, and letting yourself be lured closer, closer. And suddenly you find yourself face to face with a burning confession.

His Lear is still strong, still breathing deeply. Suddenly you begin to think that this straightforward king, thanks to his strange trick with the division of the state, voluntarily or involuntarily found a worthy bridegroom, the younger beloved daughter, eliminating the rogue.

But his number called "life" has already reached the finish line. Only a deadly trick remained ahead. Only the longue during its execution will be cut by someone's inexorable hand.

Lear will brag to the last - they say, for the sake of happiness, "you have to jump." And he jumps: a graying beard proudly pulled up - a formidable challenge to the sky - and a vulnerable, trembling human body. The image of human doom.

Its variations sound in a variety of destinies. Here is the eternally beaten puny Kent (Timofey Tribuntsev) - any creature can wipe his feet on him - swallows the tears of humiliation and again climbs to fight for justice.

Here is the handsome Edmond (Maxim Averin), poisoned from birth by a deadly virus of illegitimate birth. Get used to his bitter bread, with eternal spitting in the face. Accustomed to love his meanness, he suddenly becomes mortally tired of it and whitens his face with clown powder - in order to at least play his death from scratch.

Or the eyeless Gloucester, virtuoso played by Denis Sukhanov blindly, by ear (and at the same time his "alter ego", a product of the director's associative fantasy, is an old brawler parrot, on which they throw a rag to keep quiet in the dark).

In the finale, Butusov's performance, as if starting off from Shakespeare's text, takes off into the free flight of its own truth, proving that you feel guilt stronger than resentment, and pity is more important than justice. Not only the death of Cordelia - the death of all the daughters will make Lear gasp in pain.

But this active stubborn one will not calm down - he will alternately seat three dead daughters at three pianos. Live, play, my daughters, do not be out of tune, save me from this cacophony of lifeless bodies that have collapsed on the keys. He will fight their deaths until the light fades from his eyes.

Results, October 15, 2006

Marina Zayonts

Lyrolove

In "Satyricon" Yuri Butusov staged "King Lear", where Konstantin Raikin played, perhaps, the most difficult role of the world theatrical repertoire

Newspaper reviews, almost all, assure that there is no point in Butusov's new performance. There are separate finds, spectacular in a theatrical way, but it is not clear what it is about. And if something happened, then it was obviously by accident, somehow by itself - colleagues insist. The theater, of course, is a living, unpredictable thing, it's not like a movie shot on film, where no changes can happen anymore. In our case, anything can happen: the actor feels bad, the audience does not help (this, you know, is an important component of the action), you never know. I mean, my colleagues and I seem to have seen some very different performances. For me, in Butusov's "King Lear" both the goal is defined and the meaning is clear, although, of course, it is not as unambiguous here as twice two is four. Through a dream (and one of the reviewers already offers the public to oversleep most of the performance) it is impossible to distinguish it. Here you need to feel something, it cannot be grasped by logic alone. Here's a strange thing, with all the groans and sighs about young directors that, they say, only they are able to hear the voice of our time, it turns out that some of them "want to support", while others can be trampled without much ceremony. Meanwhile, Yuri Butusov needs support and understanding much more than, for example, Kirill Serebrennikov, who has long known to himself that he is our everything. And do you know why? Because at least he is talented. And because it changes from performance to performance, gaining experience and skills. And because he seriously reads our articles, he draws conclusions.

What is this "King Lear" about? About the fact that evil gives birth to only evil, about the fact that fathers are guilty of the crimes of children. Is it too little? Yes, not so long ago Lev Dodin staged "Lear" about the same thing, but it is not necessary to look for Butusov's clever borrowing of other people's ideas, he also wants to speak about the time in which he lives. About the collapse of the country, about the terrifying aggressiveness of the environment around us, about the loss of a person in a hostile, truly outer space. Not without reason, the wonderful artist Alexander Shishkin opened the whole stage, leaving some fragments of civilization on it - a door that leads nowhere, three broken pianos, on which, presumably, the Lira girls were taught music in childhood, and so on. Yes, not all Butusov succeeded. Yes, some things seem superfluous. Yes, the rhythms have not settled down, and the reason, in my opinion, is in the translation. Butusov made okroshka from three old translations, but the rhythm of the text does not coincide with the rhythm of the planned performance - and cannot simply coincide by definition. The rigidity of the external drawing also requires the rigidity of the text, and in the performance in this part there is complete disharmony. Yes, the first act is still worse than the second, and sometimes the director slips through some important things, hurrying to the finale. Or is it completely incomprehensible why the actress (Elena Bereznova) plays the Jester in this "Lear"? It seems that only in order to make it clear to everyone in the storm scene for the first time why Shakespeare's Jester then disappeared from the play. At Butusov's, Lear strangled him. In arms. The jester rushes to the already crazy old man with consolations (that's what a woman was needed for), hugs and in a moment falls lifeless.

That is, a performance about how easily and imperceptibly you can kill those you love. It is about fathers and children who did not find mutual understanding. It begins with the fact that Gloucester (Denis Sukhanov) puts his foot on the back of his natural son Edmond (Maxim Averin) standing in front of him on all fours, defiantly humiliating the one who will very soon become a fiend. A crude symbol, of course, but in this performance people do not stand on ceremony with each other, just like theater critics with directors. Here, as in the theater, at first they play roles, follow the rules and rituals that were established a long time ago. Lear (Konstantin Raikin) is lying on a rough plank table-platform, covering himself with a map like a blanket. An absurd, overgrown with gray bristles, muscular, stocky old man in a black cap pulled over his head. Father in every sense of the word - to daughters, subjects, everyone. He got used to reverence and, like a child, took offense at Cordelia (Natalia Vdovina), who dared to break her usual way of life. He got terribly angry, in anger he threw: here, take everything - he turned the turmoil, becoming its first victim. And everything went to hell - they become infected with anger from each other, in a rage they tear paper, pour water and other muck, they ring ominously with daggers, hate, blind, kill, finally.

They see clearly only in tragic moments. They become people. Not actors, not kings and subjects, not godfathers - people. Like Regan (Agrippina Steklova), mourning her murdered husband at the end of the first act - here, like in a movie in close-up, you can’t take your eyes off the face, distorted by pain. After all, she went crazy here too after all this, came out with some red paper mannequin in a wild dance, her hair was disheveled, her eyes were floating. It’s not Edmond she’s craving here in a criminal passion, she wants to return the love that she killed with her husband. Or Goneril (Marina Drovosekova), who had just screamed about hatred for Regan, poisoned her, seeing the corpse of her sister, could not survive what she had done, stabbed herself. Someone wrote that the actors of the "Satyricon" do not pull, Shakespeare's power is not given to them. That's not true. And Steklova, and Drovosekova, and Maxim Averin play excellently here, not sparing us or themselves. There is nothing to say about Lyra. This pathetic old man, stripped to his underpants, in a paper wreath instead of a crown, only knows what he is saying now: "I am a man." Raikin plays epiphany powerfully and very scary - either he is crying so terribly, or he is laughing. It goes to the climax, as it should be, gradually, with each scene, gaining a height from which it no longer falls. But they tell me: not his role. This is not true either. Butusov and Raikin seriously mastered the space of tragedy here, which, you see, is a rarity in today's theater. A modern tragedy, to be more precise, one where pain, laughter, antics and horror are mixed together in such a way that they cannot be torn apart. In "Richard III" they only approached her, but in the second act of "Lear" the tragedy finally submitted to them completely. Is this not an achievement?

Everyone liked the finale, where Lear tries to seat the dead daughters at the piano, and every time they fall, go limp on their round chairs. Only, they write, it is not clear what it is for. How not to understand? The old man wants to return the past, to return to childhood, where the girls were taught his music and everyone loved each other so much. Yes, it's late.

Russian courier, October 16, 2006

Alexey Filippov

Shakespeare for the office user

Yuri Butusov's production will be of interest to those who have never read "King Lear"

Moscow theaters love the St. Petersburg director Yuri Butusov: Ionesco's Macbeth and Shakespeare's Richard III in the Satyricon, Hamlet in the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater, the Satyricon's King Lear - the list is more than impressive. But Moscow critics do not like Butusov. And, it seems, it is precisely for what attracts theaters that invite the director to performances.

Butusov knows how to tell a classic play simply, freshly, fascinatingly - like today's story. He simplifies something, smoothes something, his interpretations may seem rude. At the same time, there is one vital quality for today's anemic theater in his works: Butusov returns the nerve and drive to the play, exhausted by numerous interpretations, littered with interpretations. In other words, he stages "Lear" as if it were happening for the first time, and at the same time does not fall into banality.

Against the backdrop of what has been released in Moscow over the past few years, Butus' Lear is an outstanding performance. And it's not just that Konstantin Raikin, who plays the title role, played one of his best roles here. Classical history, covered with academic dust, burns today's prefabricated, far from always intelligent auditorium. The new office audience is in demand for such directing. Is it good or bad, because she also likes the various vulgarity that generously covers today's scene? But these are still completely different things, Butusov achieves success by cultural means.

At the heart of his "Lear" is a simple idea: the basis of all evil is stubbornness and spiritual deafness, unwillingness to understand another person. It would seem unpretentious, but small, frantic, proud to the point of madness, simple-hearted, like a child, Lir Raikin squares it. He can do everything - and distribute his lands to his daughters, and shouting "I am the king!" jump on the table and pull down your pants in the castle of Goneril's eldest daughter. She tries to put them in place, but dad immediately lowers his trousers again. Lear is moral and is not going to give in - and his daughters are exactly the same.

The family is destroyed from unwillingness to make concessions, love does not save here - such is, quite a modern story. Father rested: tell me how you love me, daughter rested: I won’t tell. And the end of the relationship. Another daughter blurted out: let there be not a hundred, but fifty knights in her father's retinue, the father lost his temper ... And off we go, the tragedy began. In such a retelling, all this is trite to the point of vulgarity, the point is in the performance and director's overtones. In sincere bewilderment of Lira-Raikin, who does not understand how he - HIM! - can be contradicted. In the arrogant persistence of Goneril (Marina Drovosekova), who knows exactly how others should live. In the petty, cowardly villainy of Regan (Agrippina Steklova), she would be glad to please her father, but it’s more convenient for her, besides, she is very afraid of her sadistic husband (Konstantin Tretyakov) and older sister. Self-love and unwillingness to give in move the world, and his faithful servant, the truth-seeker Kent (Timofei Tribuntsev), who was expelled by the old king, but changed his appearance and again entered his service, became Lear's comic shadow.

The director re-emphasized the play: in the performance, it is not Kent who beats the scoundrel Oswald - the scoundrel beats the weak Kent. And that one, half-naked, beaten, humiliated, shackled in stocks, keeps threatening to finally do away with the scoundrel. This is very funny and extremely sad - a person who is convinced of his innocence sees the world as he wants to see it, and cuffs do not help him to see clearly.

And here there are many sharp, catchy and not always intelligible directorial finds. It is clear why Kent is weak in the performance, it is not clear why Shakespeare's jester became a woman for the sake of it, Butusov did not bother to explain this idea. The performance is sharp, sometimes overly aggressive, there are no halftones here, the director uses eye-catching, deliberately rough colors. In the foreground is the figure of Lear, the rest of the roles (and excellent actors are occupied in the performance) are given only in outline. But I'm not sure that this is a shortcoming of the production: Yuri Butusov created an integral work, it must be accepted or not accepted as a whole. I accept the show.

If only for the amazing last scene where Lear keeps trying to get his dead daughters to sit at the piano, and they slide down the keyboard and fall, fall, fall off their chairs. Arrogance and stubbornness did their job, the family collapsed, life ended - and you can’t stick it together anymore.

Novaya Gazeta, October 16, 2006

Elena Dyakova

I dedicated Lira to my people

"King Lear". Theater "Satyricon"

Lear - Konstantin Raikin. Gloucester - Denis Sukhanov. Regan - Agrippina Steklova. Director - Yuri Butusov. Scenography - Alexander Shishkin.

The third work of Petersburgers Butusov and Shishkin in "Satyricon" completes their Shakespearean trilogy (although the first performance, "Macbeth" with two "t", was made according to a free remake by Ionesco). Macbeth was followed by Richard III. Their "Hamlet" with Trukhin and Khabensky in the Moscow Art Theater is inscribed in the same director's notebook.

But King Lear is different from Macbeth, Richard, and Hamlet. The precise sarcasm of the detached observer and the mocking cynicism of the Stoic gave way to a different intonation. In the process of development, everything living (if it is alive) becomes more complex. So the "Moscow Shakespeare" Butusov-Shishkin is growing a new organ. That is the heart. Maybe this is a dead end branch of evolution. And yet it shrinks...

Scarlet, white, yellow spots are visible in the black air of the stage. The jester here is a young lady, acrobatically flexible red-haired Elena Bereznova in a short black velvet dress and a French cabaret bowler hat. The scarlet door, surrounded by luxurious Renaissance stucco, is very noticeable. Then all the decor will be knocked down, passions will break out, the door will burn with hellish coal.

Butusov is a professional. Textbook scenes go clean, clear, fast. But the idea of ​​this action with all its horror was expressed by the selfless critic Dobrolyubov: “Lir transfers directly to his personality all that brilliance, all the respect that he enjoyed for his dignity. This crazy conviction makes him ... go into the simple title of an ordinary person and to experience... sorrows."

The lyre of Konstantin Raikin, it seems, for a very long time does not realize how devilishly the world has cooled towards him. Truth collapses on him like ball lightning only in the scene of a storm. And then the low-current voltage of the "smart machine" of the performance explodes with a thousand volts of despair. In the darkness, alone at the ramp, the king shouts to heaven: "I am your victim! Poor! Old! Weak! ... An unadorned person is precisely this poor, naked two-legged animal, and nothing more."

Here Lear Raikin is formidable with the power of the game. Inconsolable, like Job. The whole scene is live.

It still flares up in some places, knocking out traffic jams. Here is the scene of the blinding of Gloucester: the Duke of Cornwall (Konstantin Tretyakov) is torturing the old earl somewhere in a concrete garage, confident in impunity.

Well, as you know, in this scene Cornwell himself is killed by Gloucester's servant. Accident: the guy's hand with the sword twitched in horror.

Here is Regan - Steklova plays with a huge scarlet cloth doll without a face. This is a fetish of Edmond, who connected two sisters with hatred. The doll's long scarlet arms catch the woman, enveloping her... She stretches out, gives up, trembles. The world lives without rules: Regan herself canceled them. So, the strong will win - lust and death.

Here blind Gloucester in a penitent white shirt raises knives in his hands, gnashes them, striking sparks: he anticipates the mortal duel of his sons. Looks like a Russian holy fool. As if now he will shout: "God has been waiting for a long time, but it hurts!"

And this maxim of Ivashka the Iron Cap asks for the epigraph of the performance. After all, there are two groups of citizens. Some clearly think that there is a God - such is their working hypothesis. God has covenants and prohibitions. And love. The world is based on these whales.

And others have a working hypothesis such that there is no God. But they are even happier without Him.

And here is the main question: are those for whom God exists, protected by their faith?

Or vice versa: the longer the tablet of a person, the more vulnerable he is? You believed the commandment "Honor your father ..." - opened the sides of advanced daughters.

Parka said in two. Whoever believes in the sword, poison, greed, for whom shamelessness and intelligence are synonymous, will also perish. From poison, sword and greed.

A world without covenants and prohibitions will rear up and swallow Goneril, Regan, Edmond. Petting with a blind scarlet cloth doll is expressive, like a divination.

Some characters in "Lear" will be put into the coffin by humanity. And others - brutality.

Still, the play's working hypothesis is: God exists.

He is so present that in the finale, the inconsolable mad Lear rushes between the bodies of three daughters. Black shabby pianos (each princess had her own) stand at the back. On the swivel chairs are the bodies of the victim and two criminals in scarlet, yellow, white mortal dresses.

And under the strange, plaintive music Lear rushes about, trying to seat, revive the dead. All three! It knocked out traffic jams in the soul: love and forgiveness turned out to be higher than a righteous judgment.

And the bodies slip. And he rushes between his dead children. And the darkness thickens.

He is not very even, this "King Lear". Maybe the first act will get the subtleties. After all, performances are like babies: their nervous system is being completed after birth.

But it is impossible not to say: at the premiere, the audience gave a standing ovation.

Star, of course, theater. But it seemed: nonsense-brand-branding had nothing to do with it. It's just that the finale of Lear conveys this working hypothesis with rare force: there is a God.

The hall at that moment let the theater convince itself of this. And got up - it was from this feeling

Russia , October 19, 2006

Marina Kvasnitskaya

King Lear in Search of Truth

In the last theatrical season, the debate around the Moscow Art Theater Hamlet staged by Yuri Butusov died down, dividing the theatergoers into fans and opponents of his interpretation of Shakespeare's tragedy. And now a new premiere - and new controversy.

Butusov released the premiere of the play "King Lear" in the "Satyricon". Konstantin Raikin, as always, in all the splendor of his charm in a great tragic role. His Lear sleeps on a cot, runs around the stage in family shorts and so throws away a black cap, called in the common people "killerka", as if this is the crown, which he neglected.

The play is very well chosen specifically for this group: they love large-scale passions, a bright, expressive manner of playing. The best actors know how to rise to a tragic farcical sound. Perhaps it is this quality that is valued above all else in this troupe. Fans of the "Satyricon" style always know what to expect from new productions - this is a picture painted with oil paints, and with broad strokes.

The actors play out a very modern story of the disintegration of a large family, torn apart by selfish interests. But the more Regan and Goneril try to snatch from the family pie, the closer they are to their personal collapse, and simply to death. The production designer Alexander Shishkin created the image of a large family table assembled from long wide planks. As the intrigue unfolds, each character who prefers selfish goals to family values ​​will loosen this structure by pulling out the board. And, pulling it out, he will carry it on his back, like his cross through life. The director builds the story of Regan, Goneril and the illegitimate son of Gloucester Edmond in such a way that we look into everyone's faces, living together the moment of choice and the bitterness of retribution for an act. At least you can understand them. Edmond was on the sidelines of life through no fault of his own. Regan, a weak, suggestible girl, was strongly influenced by her older sister Goneril and, overcoming her natural indecision, copies her actions. The eldest daughter Lira is so ambitious that her father simply forces her to take extreme actions with her behavior. Here Lear sets the tone for everything, and even being deprived of the throne, he, as a director, sets the scenario for everyone's behavior in life.

The biggest intrigue of this play is the motivation of the king to give all power to the heirs. The director brings Lear on stage in the guise of Raikin - a man in his prime. Only at the time of the division of the kingdom, he was depressed, went out and tired of himself. He spends the entire scene of the division of property lying on his back on a huge family table. It seems that he decided to conduct a grand experiment. Until that time, he had not thought about whether he was doing good or bad. Each of his decisions is the truth in the highest instance. So money and power distorted his worldview. He decided to find the truth in its purest form, putting himself in dependent conditions. Oddly enough, but everyone dances to his tune and without direct subordination. Lear, as a catalyst, accelerated all the processes that went on in the family. Those who were ready for betrayal in their hearts "made it. And it seems that Lear was afraid to die without seeing the future of his family. And the future is rather bitter. But the more bitterness, the more clearly Lear finds new contacts with reality and lives the last piece of life very The main discoveries lie in the field of self-knowledge.Perhaps, this performance should be watched by a cohort of oligarchs - it has a sobering effect.

The best part of the role was Lear's monologue: "Blow, wind, blow, puffing out your cheeks!" Konstantin Raikin pronounces it so desperately that both the bitterness and the sweetness of his opposition to the elements of nature are visible. His character discovers in himself the ability to love and hate in the same way that a sage reaches heights, surrendering for a while to the power of stupidity. It seems that the head of the theater "Satyricon" himself allowed himself to express feelings more than usual. He violently tears up a very influential newspaper on the stage. Curious, and why did they annoy him so much? At the very least, the paper's sales should increase: enough copies are needed to litter the front of the stage with readable logo scraps. Then the characters take the janitor's brooms and sweep this rubbish, ashes, ashes, embodied illusions away from the stage. And each actor puts his energy into it. Obviously, the performance also has a healing psychotherapeutic effect for the actors. And this sincerity is captivating.

It is difficult to judge the performance by the first premiere screenings. The performance is like a unit in which everything is thought up masterfully, but it has yet to go through commissioning. While each actor thinks more about his own drawing of the role than about the general outline of the performance, acting technique comes to the fore, and light breathing still. wrong. But it is already possible to judge which of the actors has taken the lead, and which is marking time, repeating previous successful discoveries.

The game of Marina Drovosekova (Goneril) has become much thinner. And if earlier she took the pressure of temperament, now she relies on an interesting role pattern. Agrippina Steklova (Regan) is trying to move away from her clichés of an eccentric clowness. And sometimes she succeeds. Her work in the entreprise with the dramaturgy of McCoy, who is unlikely to be staged within the walls of her native theater, benefited her - she gained new colors. Maxim Averin worked so selflessly on the image of the traitor Edmond that he became one of the biggest discoveries of this performance. And although he has already played the role of a traitor in the play "Macbeth" by Ionesco directed by Butusov, he does not repeat at all. And his love scene with Regan is beyond praise. Powerful, subtle, concise.

Denis Sukhanov in the tragic role of a devoted father - Gloucester brought to the performance the expression of a plastic image. When the son carries him on his shoulders, he is like a broken doll. And this capacious visual image in a verbose tragedy gives the whole story some kind of air, a perspective of a different perception.

Artem Osipov in the role of Edgar and the King of France upset with his unaccountable copying of his teacher Konstantin Raikin. And if earlier it looked like a cute feature of an aspiring actor in love with a teacher, then it's time for maturity. It's time to find your face. Otherwise, he will soon be uninteresting on stage. Natalia Vdovina as Cordelia remains in the shadow of the entire cast. Probably, over time, she will become more accustomed to this not very grateful role - the suffering victim.

And if the performance looks uneven so far, then the last scene of Lear's farewell to his dead daughters is the most powerful. Until recently, the girlish figures at the piano were full of life. And here are their dead bodies - on swivel chairs. Lear tries to seat them as if they were alive. Bodies fall. He, insane, picks them up, sits them down again. His daughters are stunningly beautiful at this moment. The plasticity of lifeless silhouettes, the movement of what will be forever, is the most striking find of this performance.

He has served in the "Satyricon" since 1981 to this day, since 1988 - its permanent leader and, in addition, the People's Artist of Russia. Konstantin Raikin is a legendary actor, winner of four "Golden Masks", "The Seagull", two state awards, orders "For Merit to the Fatherland" and a huge number of prestigious awards.

The films "Truffaldino from Bergamo", "Much Ado About Nothing", the series "Poirot's Failure" and other significant works in major projects on television, the brightest roles in performances made Konstantin Arkadyevich really popular. He is the founder of VShSI K. Raikin and teaches a course at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater, acts in films and plays in the theater. The environment actively influenced him: both parents practically lived in acting - the incredible Arkady Isaakovich and Ruth Markovna. The family business continues: his wife Elena and daughter Polina are also actresses. It is noteworthy that all of them do not live in the shadow of famous relatives and have developed their own professional roles.

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Winner of prestigious awards - Stanislavsky, "Golden Lyre", "Seagull" and "Theater Stars", concurrently - the infinitely talented Agrippina Steklova, a woman who is good both on the wide screen and in the theater.

She is an Honored Artist of the Russian Federation and the leading actress of the Satyricon. Roles in the films “The Geographer Drank His Globe Away”, “Koktebel”, “Small Demon” and the TV series “Law”, “Hunting for Manchurian Deer”, “Poor Relatives”, “Citizen Chief”, as well as in productions, “Richard III”, “ The London Show and many others - the bright appearance of the red-haired beauty and the successful completion of the workshop of Mark Zakharov at the RATI allow her to perfectly embody any images both in cinema and on the stage.

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Honored "Capercaillie" of the Russian Federation Maxim Averin is the face of an entire era - he is brutal, charming and certainly talented. Deciding to become a star, the young actor auditioned for VGIK and the Shchepkinskoye school, but chose the legendary Pike.

He is extremely versatile, which is proved not only by filming in the theater, cinema and TV series, but also by roles in the videos of Svetlana Roerich and the Bravo group, a host and jury member on Channel One, plus recording an album with Laura Quint.

The actor was a regular member of the troupe in the "Satyricon" for more than eighteen years, where he was called, and then, in 2015, he decided to head off to work on the wide screen, and also to participate in entreprises. Now Maxim Averin is an Honored Artist of Russia, the owner of TEFI, "The Seagull", the Government Prize in the field of culture and the "Silver Horseshoe".

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Glafira Tarkhanova graduated from the Vishnevskaya school with a degree in opera singing, then she was not taken to Pike and GITIS. The final choice was the legendary Moscow Art Theater under the strict guidance of Raikin. Now she has been a regular member of the Satyricon theater troupe for over fifteen years.

Beauty Daria in "Treason", charming Nastya in "Thunder", beautiful Dina in "Lovers", Cordelia in "King Lear", Bianca in "Taming" and more than fifty other roles in films, TV series, and also - work in theatrical productions.

Tarkhanova is a theater and film actress, the owner of Crystal Turandot, Moscow Debuts and the mother of four children. In addition to all this, she became a certified psychologist, was the host of the television project Save My Child and a participant in the show Dancing with the Stars.

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Cordelia, Lear's daughter- Glafira Tarkhanova

Impressions are very diverse, I must say.
From liked:
- actually, Raikin :) I always liked him very much, but - young, in films. And then "the idiot's dream came true" - I saw Konstantin Arkadievich on stage.
- the game of some actors. Here is very, very - Edgar (Artem Osipov). It's funny - I thought that I also liked the King of France, and after that I considered that this is the same Artem Osipov :) The Jester was also nice.
- the last scene with pianos.
From the dislikes:
- insanely noisy. Just a cacophony of sounds. Still feeling that the equipment is not too good :(
- there are too many tricks that are quite old (in fact, the performance is not the first year, of course), and which directly yell from the stage: "And we are the director's original tricks !!!". Not interested.
- the game of most actors, oddly enough. Especially the ladies were not pleased. In general, it is interesting - the feeling that everyone played their own - some sincerely and emotionally, some played "tricks", some recited and wringed their hands. It's certainly fun to watch, but nothing more.

The result of the performance - it was necessary to watch, at least for the sake of Raikin ... And in order to form your own opinion, because if you believe the reviews, most of the audience are indescribably delighted, and a smaller (but still noticeable) part is offended in the best feelings :)) But "wow" didn't happen, so... Just an opinion.

Here are some photos from the internet. To convey the atmosphere :)

In general, this is my second trip to the Satyricon (about 5 years ago), and I come to the conclusion that the theater, apparently, is "not mine." Among other things, it is completely not focused on the viewer. Nothing for convenience. There is not a single (!) bench in front of the wardrobe. Latecomers are not allowed into the hall - at all. No "standing in the last row, so as not to interfere." I would also understand this in a small hall, where every movement draws attention from the stage - but here the hall is huge, and there is enough swarming in it! By the way, when someone came out in the middle of the action (apparently, they couldn’t stand it), it didn’t seem to interfere, apparently :) The ushers ladies don’t know how the seats in the hall are distributed. Thanks to their "help" I had to make my way through the entire row from 1st to 18th place. Row was 20, there the seats, in fact, do not go the way they do in others, but - that's why they are theater attendants, to look at the ticket and direct the viewer to the seats, no? And these announcements about phones and photography are insanely unpleasant. Especially delivered that the ladies-servants ran around the hall before the beginning and yelled at those who tried to take pictures in the hall, threatened to take away the equipment.

How can one scene contain so much anger and despair, horror and joy, bitterness and anger, laughter and sorrow? This is impossible. It's attractive and captivating. It's creepy. It's creepy when you touch the wild, ragged energy of madness. You touch the hearts of the actors and feel their firm, confident beat, you feel that they believe in themselves, and you begin to believe yourself, and therefore you allow yourself to be dragged as low as possible, to the very bottom, covered with scraps of newspapers, thoughts, lives. The atmosphere, music, staging, acting, lighting - all this definitely makes you believe that the life of real people is unfolding in front of you, unfortunate people whom you cannot help, because they can no longer be pulled out of that slow horror in in which they get stuck, as if in a bottomless swamp. It seems that the madness that has engulfed the stage pierces the brain like a sewing machine needle: without stopping, back and forth, bursting into the temples with red threads, singing angels, dancing with the devil, terrible visions and wild squeals. Images embedded in water, white paint, stones under a road sign, the movement of a frame with spotlights, fabrics, a piano and hanging lamps amaze the mind. It's amazing how everything can be thought through to the smallest detail: from a short sound to a fleeting smile, from the movement of light to the semantics of color. You are standing in front of an abyss in which floundering, twisting, turning inside out, shining with scarlet flesh, warm and cold, wet and dirty, sweet and bitter madness, all the madness of the existence of mankind, with all its vices, with all its giblets. You are standing, and next to you is a creature with eyes that shine like two moons, with horns swaying in the wind. It tells you, “Jump, friend. There's a break here. Do you see? And you are walking. Walking into a murderous imagination. The performance struck me to the core, I liked it so much that it was a pity to leave the hall and it was impossible to get rid of a bright smile, as if shouting: “Thank you! Thank you, thank you! Thank you for believing everything, down to the smallest detail, thank you for the unique character of each character, for the game, for the laughter and for the sadness. Thank you for the pleasant state of thought that engulfed me after the stage was empty. Thank you for food for thought, for inspiration and pleasure, for reality, for a beautiful embodiment. Thank you for what it is, for the fact that it exists and has become a part of me. Several times tears appeared in my eyes, and when everyone around me stood up and began to applaud, sparing no palms, I clearly understood only one thing: If I could kneel, I would. But even this would not be enough.