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St. Petersburg: A Tale Of Two Theaters
| Article
# : |
10693 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
6 / 1993 |
2,101 Words |
| Author
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Claudia Woolgar
Claudia Woolgar is a free-lance theater critic and arts
journalist based in London. |
Feeling like a lost extra from Doctor Zhivago, I got off the night train from Moscow. St. Petersburg stood before me, a beautiful city muffled in the tumbling snow and soaked in history. And, as every historian knows, there is no history without conflict and division.
Founded in 1703 by Peter the Great, St. Petersburg has also been known as Petrograd and Leningrad, depending on who was in power at the time (it reverted to St. Petersburg in 1991). As far as the conflict surrounding the city, however, it has been far from purely "nominal." In 1917 the Russian Revolution began here, resulting in the murder of the royal family and the initiation of decades of communist rule. And for nine hundred days during the Second World War the Nazis held the city under siege, devastating both the infrastructure and its population.
Enough, they say, is never enough, however, and conflict persists to this day in St. Petersburg. But this is a war of artistic differences, a division in which the two camps concentrate their forces, draw up plans of action, and ignore each other. They do not meet in battle, and they do not meet in discussion to learn from each other. The traditional theater and the experimental theater, two camps standing firm, are decidedly separated in the St. Petersburg of 1993.
Ensconced in a theater just off Nevsky Prospekt, and fought over by producers world wide seeking to arrange tours, is the Maly Theater. The reputation this company enjoys is tremendous, and one week at the theater proves why. The company's work is traditional, but alive, down to its finest detail and smallest role. The theater group has come a long way since its founding in 1944 by bureaucratic decree. Unfortunately, while the company was "probably [founded] with a good intention… bureaucrats do not do theater," notes Lev Dodin, who this month celebrates ten years as artistic director of the Maly. Dodin, who does do theater, is a man who oozes quiet confidence and surety, traits that are evident in the Maly stage productions.
Straight off the train, I feel into Dodin's recreation of Dostoyevsky's The Possessed, performed during a whirlwind week in which the Maly played its entire repertoire--as exhausting for the audience as for the company. At nine hours in one day, The Possessed is a gargantuan feat for critics and cast alike, but its brooding, dimly lit world breathes an intensity that battles through fatigue and any language barrier.
The setting for the
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