Chekhov in new technologies: the first NFT performance was released in St. Petersburg
A large screen is installed in the foyer on the second floor - a kind of portal to the NFT-collection of images of the production. Serebryakov, Voinitsky, Astrov and other heroes of the play migrated to the "figure" and found a new shell there ...
This is the directorial debut of actor Alexei Morozov. Magnificent work of set designer and costume designer Gala Filatova.
The correspondent of "RG" visited the theater and, after watching the performance, talked with its creators.
What is unique about your performance? In that you use new technologies?
Alexey Morozov: Not only. What is NFT? A unique certificate of ownership of a particular digital art object. Nobody in the world theater has ever used these technologies. Of course, we are pioneers in this area, and this creates additional excitement around the performance.
But there is also an original idea of the original concept: with rather conditional scenery and very fantasy costumes, the actors play in the tradition of Russian psychological theater: through the action, "cling" to each other, picking up each other, speaking in concepts, not in words. And if somewhere a semblance of the so-called formal theater arises, then this is only a game of formal theater, and not itself. The most valuable thing for me in this performance is that the actors try to speak with human, not "acting" voices. No formal theater can replace living eyes, specific human intonations, intelligibility of people's relationships on the stage.
"Not with acting voices" ... And this is the actor speaking!
Alexey Morozov: When I stood on the other side of the ramp, I saw everything with completely different eyes.
Have you decided not to tie the performance to a specific time?
Alexey Morozov: Yes, I am trying to explore the so-called "Russian chronos", unshakable and eternal. After all, this story could happen in Russia at any time - in the 19th century, in the 20th and in the 21st ... And in a thousand years it will be the same. This is both a plus and a minus of a Russian person. We will always be mistaken, we will replace reality with illusions. And we will always say that "it is better to drink - to die than not to drink - to die." Elena Andreevna will always say: "The devil of destruction sits in all of you." These words are perhaps the most important for me in this play now, given the tragedy of what is happening in the country and in the world. Unhappy in this house, unhappy in this world ...
What is in the "Russian chronos"? The artistic decision of the performance is also connected with this. The wonderful artist Gala Filatova and I have been looking for him for a long time, there were many different options. The found design of the performance is outside everyday logic, timeless framework. It's the same story with costumes.
We do not have main characters and minor ones, each actor draws his own theme. Voinitsky - "Life is gone!", Astrov - "Russian forests are cracking under the axe." Elena Andreevna - about destruction, Sonya - about hope, Telegin - about dignity, nanny Marina - about order, and so on.
It is stated that there will be two different interpretations of the image of Uncle Vanya, played by Oleg Gayanov and Arkady Koval.
Alexey Morozov: This is true. I have known both actors well for many years - we served together in the MDT, they are students of Lev Dodin. Koval and Gayanov are two completely different acting personalities. For me, the personal manifestations of the actors are very important, and each opens in his own way. If Voinitsky of Oleg Gayanov can claim some reciprocal feelings from Elena Andreevna (this is how we build these relationships, there is even some struggle for her between Astrov and Voinitsky), then in the case of Uncle Vanya Arkady Koval, it is obvious that this is impossible, the struggle is on within himself. We do not sculpt an unshakable image of Uncle Vanya: the actors do not reach for some fixed image of Voinitsky, but try to re-transmit their human individuality to the role at each performance. Different performers even have different mise-en-scenes.
When creating the performance, NFT technologies were used. Many people ask: what is it? Performance - a quest, a game?
Alexey Morozov: It was immediately obvious that in addition to staging a good performance, it was necessary to create an interesting activity around it that would attract spectators, especially young people. Modern schoolchildren and students will see a poster: “Chekhov, Uncle Vanya”, they will yawn and pass by. But the first NFT performance in Russia may be of interest to them.
A club of friends of the play - DAO has been created. There are special preferences for members of this club: informal meetings with artists, backstage tours, privileges on tickets and NFT tokens.
On the site miron.fun, in the collection of the play, neuroacoustic paintings of the monologues of the characters, spinning GIF-characters of all the characters of the play are exhibited: they can be bought, exchanged, rented. If people come to the performance, interested in such unusual activity, and leave the hall touched, then we have achieved our goal.
How did you come up with the scenery, create costumes, look for props?
Gala Filatova, stage designer and costume designer: We set ourselves the task of trying to do without large wooden enclosures and imitation of "village life". But I wanted to show the elements that, perhaps, were in any house of Anton Pavlovich's contemporaries. And the idea came to try to save these elements, to pack them into some kind of "capsules". I managed to find an almost dead chair of the Thonet brothers (Thonet No. 4) from antique dealers. This is a rare model, created in 1860 for the Parisian cafe "Daum". Collectors are still after her. Such a chair could also be in the house of Anton Pavlovich's parents. And this chair, and the clock, and the carving elements that were used to decorate the facades, and bent legs, and parts of the table for endless tea parties, and cups, and the samovar, and even the characters themselves from time to time become museum exhibits. Our working version is "Uncle Vanya's Museum". From here, transparent capsules were born, in which, like in a museum, the attributes of life in the hinterland are stored.
It is not clear for us in what year, century the performance takes place. Inventing costumes, I wanted, on the one hand, to correspond to Chekhov's characters, to preserve the archetypes, on the other hand, to dress the heroes in modern clothes. She experimented, took risks, literally cheated... Oddly enough, but the use of the texture of "multi-colored mud" was prompted by a visit to the exhibition of Mikhail Vrubel. After all, he is a contemporary of Chekhov. His famous painting is "Pan" (almost a Russian goblin), and the play originally had the title "Goblin". I remember that I dyed Serebryakov’s cashmere coat with silicone and understood that if it didn’t harden, I would have to cut it, and then instead of a coat I would get a jacket ...
And how did you react to the director's proposal to apply new technologies?
Gala Filatova: As for NFT, let's go to new levels! We are trying to understand. As our children say, "you will all be there." The world is changing.
Oleg Gayanov (Voynitsky Ivan Petrovich), actor of the Maly Drama Theater - Theater of Europe:
- I have been working with one director for 34 years - Lev Dodin, my teacher. There were meetings with Chekhov: "A play without a title", "The Cherry Orchard" (Epikhodov), "The Seagull" (Shamraev). And here is an invitation to another theater, work with a new director - with Alexei Morozov, who served as an actor in our Small Drama Theater.
Like any actor, I had a long list of roles that I would like to play. And Voinitsky is on this list. I am very grateful to Alexei Morozov and Vlad Furmanov for the invitation and trust. For meeting great artists who are interesting to face in extreme circumstances and keep the tension. I really fell in love with this legendary house.
Of course, I experienced joy and excitement when I was offered the role of Voinitsky, and already during rehearsals - all the difficulties that are inevitable when creating a role of this magnitude. We had a lot of ideas, options, looking for different ways to play - under our unusual scenery. But in any scenery, a person will remain a person - even if he gets to Mars. Feelings and passions, love and hatred, suffering will remain the same as thousands of years ago. This is both beautiful and priceless classic. I have long been interested only in what happens on stage with a person and between people. Something, of course, strong. And Chekhov, like no one else, gives the artist, and therefore the viewer, the opportunity to truly experience this strong. This is a joint and very difficult work, a joint catharsis. This is the greatest pleasure, excitement and inspiration for the artist.
Mikhail Razumovsky (Doctor Astrov), actor of the Theater "On Liteiny":
- As for NFT, it's a dense forest for me, it's not for me - I'm a man of the old formation, a loser of the Internet. In the performance, these new technologies do not appear, these are parallel things ...
Chekhov belongs to the unconditional geniuses of mankind. His plays will be re-read regularly, all his life. Like Pushkin's works, like Bulgakov's Master and Margarita. You are always discovering something new for yourself. It's like watching an old movie that you already know by heart - and suddenly you notice new nuances. The last time I played Chekhov was in 1995 at the Na Liteiny Theatre: Three Sisters, Salty. And this is the first "Uncle Vanya" in my life. I understand that Voinitsky is not my role. Astrov… It was very interesting for me to find my attitude to this material, because there are many ideas of embodiment. I love Chekhov very much and want to try to convey his pain, his human confusion and ghostly hopes to every viewer. It is no coincidence that Astrov is a doctor, and like no one else, he contains the code of the great author's interaction with this world.
Anastasia Kvitko (Sonya Serebryakova), actress of the Andrei Mironov Theater:
- My heroine is close to me, I play this role with pleasure. It would seem that Sonya is inconspicuous, but with such a rich inner world, she loves nature, is observant, generous, brave and hardworking, she can pick up words for everyone! She is attentive to the household. He hurries to reconcile his grandmother and Uncle Vanya, pities his godfather Telegin. He loves his uncle, so he tries to be softer with him, to support him. He tries to reach out to the souls of others when he sees that they need it. Everyone is confiding with her. She is the soul of this story. But it so happens that everyone is busy with themselves, and everyone is in dislike, in disadvantage. The metaphor of the performance: while drinking tea, destinies are broken.
In the final monologue, I try to put the thought that we need to live here and now, and not think that something good will happen to us later (“behind the grave ... we will see a bright, beautiful life ...”). Even if love breaks your heart... Despite the pain of the soul, my heroine does not give up, she seems to feel responsible for others and cannot afford to give up.
While working on the performance, we talked a lot about technologies, about NFTs. This is so new for all of us, unknown ... The emotions that we, actors, give birth to, live every time, will be digitized. And the audience can see it. We also recorded various videos: how we do not appear in the performance, our inner state, how you can express yourself - in addition to Chekhov's texts and those mise en scenes that we came up with. NFTs allow you to reveal more characters than is written in the play.
By the way
The next performance is February 26th.
