Before the performance

Lermontov’s “The Demon”, directed by Kirill Serebrennikov, is performed at the Mossovet Theatre, on the stage “under roof”. The hall seats 120. A heavy rough stone is hung above the center of the craftily constructed stage (art-director Nikolai Simonov). In one of the first scenes (“He soared above the peaks of ice…”) this stone starts to swing like a pendulum. It flies very close to Oleg Menshikov’s face. Menshikov’s Demon is bored to wing above the rocks, he dives, risking breaking, and again shoots upwards – and it is portrayed very vividly. However, the effect costs dear. At the very first public show (not in the scene of flight, but later), the stone slashed Menshikov’s lip, and so seriously that they had to cancel the second show. The third was the last in the season. Shall I explain what was going on at the entrance?
All the preliminary arrangements were immediately forgotten: we are sorry, but we have force majeur, default and all that. Yes, we promised. No, we can’t. Of course, you can wait, and in case something, we will… etc. And astonished eyes: what critics, when there’s hardly enough seats for the Rabbit’s company?
The only way out was to leave, finding comfort in the usual “they-are-Russians-and-that-explains-a-lot”. And at this moment, in the best traditions of the romantic theatre, a man in black appeared, gave me his ticket and then introduced himself: “V., advisor to President of the National Reserve Bank. Sponsor’s representative”. Astonished, I couldn’t even thank him properly for the gesture fitting Sir Phillip Sidney: take my flask, soldier, your need is greater than mine. I thank him now, and from the depths of my heart.
The story is told to encourage those who will long for “The Demon”, realizing perfectly, that there are not and will not be any tickets available. No, they won’t be available. But miracles happen.

Around the performance

I promised to wait till autumn with the review, and I am going to keep my word. This is not a review. I won’t write about the quality of the theatrical form and assess directing and acting. Maybe, it is early to speak about the acting and tell how good are Natalia Shvets (Tamara), Anatoly Beliy (Tamara’s fiancee, the Angel) and Oleg Menshiov in “The Demon”. I don’t think it’s too early, but my word is my word. For that reason, I will speak about the readable senses: why Lermontov’s poem was put on the stage and what the role of the Demon means in Menshikov’s artistic life. It is more important to understand the goals of this performance than to discuss its strong and weak points. If I will err in the interpretations, it is not me who will decide what to blame: either my lack of sensitiveness or the indistinctness of the theatrical message. The questions will remain open: “non-critical” position has its advantages.
Kirill Serebrennikov says that it was he who offered Menshikov to stage “The Demon” and that people, who heard this idea were saying the same thing: “Menshikov as the Demon? Exactly, exactly!” I am ready to believe the first statement. “To play a poem” is an idea which either implies directing know-how, or is not worth a curse. I have no doubts in the second statement: Menshikov’s demonic charm and “fatal gift” is admitted not only by excited fans, but by reasonable critics as well. Tatiana Moskvina simply predicted “demonism” as the leading creative theme for him. “Lermontov, Dostoyevsky, Beliy, Blok, and many others – all Russian literature, penetrated by the flashes of the great ancient tragedy (“Oh, how low you fell, Lucifer, the son of the morning star!”), would be in his competence”, she wrote in 1999, after the curly “Barber of Siberia” was premiered.
Of course, it is easy to imagine Menshikov as Stavrogin in “Demons” or Nikolai Ableukhov in “Petersburg”. Only I think these roles will add nothing to what is played in “The Demon” and, thirteen years earlier, in “Caligula”. Moreover, the perspective to obtain the type of the “fallen angel” is not very attractive, in my opinion.
But everything is right about the Great Russian literature: actor Menshikov needs it, and it needs actor Menshikov too, especially now. His talent includes deep and serious faithfulness to the author’s sense. To break this faithfulness, he must disfigure himself greatly, and suffer torments according to the Ukrainian principle “worse, but different” is not for Menshikov. What new did he bring into the character of the Demon? Nothing. But he, excuse my words, personified it – is it not enough?
Menshikov’s Demon, in full correspondence to what is written in the poem, is not a spirit of evil, but a spirit of exile. Hell is as alien to him, as Heaven. The phrase “Evil itself to him seemed tame” is pronounced without any pathos, and moreover without any self-pity. It sounds simply, as an axiom, and doesn’t need any confirmations, sufficiently provided by the director. Kirill Serebrennikov brought on the stage playful evil spirits of quite terrifying looks (the nearest analogue is the horror film “Hell Raisers” in fast forward playing) and invented plenty of disgustingly curious actions for them. Something of the kind he did in “Sweet Bird of Youth”, when he turned the beadswoman into a choir of caricature Erinyes. It seems that the “group of the evil spirits” is an object of serious interest to Serebrennikov. However, it was not necessary to add “The Demon’s” plot with the whole bunch of frisking goblins. It was clear from the very first minutes that Menshikov’s hero is not the “part of that Power which would the Evil ever do, and ever does the Good”, but a creature of an absolutely different breed. Once, playing Ganya Ivolgin in “The Idiot” Menshikov reminded Inna Soloviova of Napoleon on the Bridge at Arcole. Looking at the Demon, one could remember Napoleon at the Elba – not the real one, stout and bald, but the one mythologized by the 19th century romantics. The Demon’s love for Tamara is his “hundred days”, which promised the return to the joys of life, but resulted in the full and hopeless defeat.
Is this love “demonic”? Not in the least. Menshikov’s hero doesn’t tempt his darling with the forbidden passion, but falls in love sincerely and headlong. His lines include Lermontov’s panegyric to Tamara (“And man from Eden forth must fare / No beauty such as this, I swear…”). You must hear, with what excited astonishment these words are filled in Menshikov’s performance. You must hear how he sings “On the wastes of airy ocean”, - just like a father, lulling his dear and exhausted child. You must appreciate the completeness of self-oblivion. “And in my days of blessedness / You were my only lack…” - this lies was uttered with a thrilled belief: it was really so, it couldn’t be other way. The Demon, swearing to “look for faith”, absolutely doesn’t remember that repentance, prayer and reconciliation with the Heaven are impossible for him. Moreover, he doesn’t remember that his kiss is deathly for a human.
None can play that very “doesn’t remember” better than Menshikov. The most glorious quality of his talent is the ability to immediately switch the registers of spiritual life. “He (the Demon) is ironic, cruel, lyrical and terribly lonely at the same time. And inside of Menshikov there’s all that”, says Serebrennikov, trying to explain, why the role is difficult and why the actor’s nature is unique. He explains poorly. “All that” and many other things can be found in almost any person. The point is that irony and lyricism, cruelty and tenderness, hatred and love in Menshikov’s heroes are clear states of the spiritual essence. A new emotion doesn’t grow from the previously experienced one and doesn’t keep its traces: it replaces the previous emotion, immediately and fully. It always seemed that Menshikov’s brilliant and prudent performance (prudence is the best alley to sincerity) is akin to the art of juggling – and it may seem now. However, the emotions of the Demon are genuinely and exhaustingly weighty. No other previous Menshikov’s characters knew such emotional weight, including Caligula. It is not the case when you can juggle with the usual sleight of hand. There are scenes, in which… but I swore off to write about it.
I’ll have to keep silence about some other matters too, as I don’t see any opportunity to speak about the director’s and actors’ treatment of the verse without assessment. The quality of “poesy” is extremely important for Serebrennikov. He offered the actors a special, exaggeratedly elevated manner of speech and obliged to voice-stress the alliterations (“Ah, fathther, fathther, leave your ththreats / Scold nott your daughtter yett again…”) and instructed them during the rehearsals: “Tolya, you pronounced the monologue about ‘l’, but not about ‘m’”. It is all very nice, but poetry differs from prose not only by the means of combining sounds. The more important are the means of developing the idea and the degree of its condensation. As an example, we can remember, following Joseph Brodsky, the remark “Not noble, but kingly” in Tsvetayeva’s “End of Kazanova”. “Let’s now imagine”, Brodsky writes, “how much will it take Chekhov”. This is what was worth teaching and studying, of course, in case the lack of natural gift doesn’t make the studies senseless. And alliteration can be extracted form anything – say, from ffire saffety ffunction.
However, it is not of great importance. The most important in “The Demon” is the perspective: the full return of Oleg Menshikov into the theatre life of Russia.

After the performance

Judging by the production, he is emotionally ready to return and justify the most daring hopes. Not those, which were pinned on the charming Kostik from “The Pokrovskie Gate”, but other ones, more sufficient. The role of the Demon, I want to believe, concludes the romantic period in Menshikov’s theatre life, the prolonged phase of the “wax ripeness” (Robespierre, Caligula, Nizhinsky, Esenin, Chatsky). Everything is done in full and with vengeance. The “Free spirit of the air” has nowhere to fly: the freedom turned out to be fruitless, absolute power – fake, and the “crowd of spirits on service” displayed their disgusting mugs. It is not said with words, but it is played, and it means it is true. The actor has changed. It is high time for him to change the rules of the game.
Do I have proofs? Yes, I do. It is the mature and proud passion, ringing in the Demon’s oath. The monologue “By the first day of the creation”, naturally, became the climax of the performance. And that face of Menshikov that grew older and numb in the last scene. “It seemed a death-like cold infernal / Lay on that frozen face and brow”, Lermontov wrote, and Menshikov again plays exactly what is written. The talks about the unearthly (“he is ten thousand years old, and he is of no nationality…”, etc.) should be stopped: the actor gains the full strength of his real age. He can play what has never been played in Russia properly and what now is more necessary than ever – the tragedy of honor. In that high and essential sense, which the word “honor” had for Karamzin and Pushkin, in that very sense, which is totally excluded form our everyday life. Actually, we don’t even have such plays, but Menshikov may magnificently play Shakespeare’s Coriolanus or Don Fernando in “The Constant Prince” - or he may not.
Menshikov doesn’t need a genius director that badly. In case he has a great play, he can do with a sensible and fairly talented one (but still more gifted than Galina Dubovskaya and more experienced than Menshikov himself). He needs a good ensemble, and his Theatrical Company will never have it, even if the actors will be cast by the gracious angels. Menshikov is unhappy with associates. Sometimes he was lucky with partners (Tatiana Doguileva in “The Sport Scenes…” and Alexander Feklistov in “Nizhinsky”), but not with the people who take trouble of arranging his life in art. Even Vanessa Redgrave was of more harm to him, than of use: she took Menshikov away from Russia at the very moment, when he just started to form as a great (I’m serious saying “great”) actor, and his life was thrown out of time and gabbled askew. Now he has a chance to replay everything on the new ground, but there’s little hope he will use this chance. First of all, he would have to close his theatre agency, mistakenly named “comradeship”. He wouldn’t want to correct the mistake.
Concerning the proper value of “The Demon”, this performance, at all the present and expected virtues, will hardly become a theatrical event. The share of theatre-lovers and “useful people” at the premiere, and the difference in treating them make you think about the bad: the tickets to Menshikov as the Demon can easily become a kind of small, but elegant bribe. Much easier, than the tickets to Vysotsky as Hamlet in the 1970s. One can recall many unpleasant things about those times, but they after all were more modest than ours. Besides, the happy Taganka ticketless viewers could at least stand on the balcony, but the hall of 120 seats can be completely transformed into a sort of sauna with swans for VIP-clients, if one wishes… I am afraid that such decision has ripened behind producer Menshikov’s back. And Menshikov has only one way to stifle it: to screw himself up, reward his present associates with what they deserve (some – box on the ears, some – low bow), send his unhappy producing activity to hell and do what the God ordered. And, indeed, he ordered – and so far hasn’t cancelled his orders.