In the first place, this performance is unusual because much is for the first time there. Oleg Menshikov for the first time in many years works with a director: since “Caligula” staged by Petr Fomenko, the actor created performances independently and was not only a self-producer, but a self-director too. After seeing a few Kirill Serebrennikov’s productions, Menshikov decided that Serebrennikov was the kind of director he would like to work with.

Kirill Serebrennikov offered to stage “The Demon”, which puzzled the actor slightly as he remembered only the first two lines from this romantic poem – those about “His way above the sinful earth…” Lermontov’s “Demon” is being staged so seriously for the first time in Moscow too. But Kirill Serebrennikov has been interested in this poem for a long time and is happy that it has no scenic tradition – he can produce something zero-based. In Rostov-na-Donu the director experimented with the poem, likening Lermontov’s verse to the sound of mantra. But in Moscow he faces such material for the first time. In the capital Serebrennikov became known mainly by his new drama productions – the plays by Vasily Sigarev, Mark Ravenhill and the Presnyakov brothers. Tennessee Williams’s “Sweet Bird of Youth”, staged by the director at the “Sovremennik” Theatre with Marina Neyolova, in a way also can be considered a modern topical plot. But “The Demon” is of different sort. And to produce it, the director had to invent a completely different theatrical language.
“The Demon” will resemble a mystery, where words, music and dance are combined. At that, the mystery will be exaggeratedly archaic. The ancient atmosphere of the performance will be created by the score composed by Alexander Bakshi especially for this production, with exotic oriental instruments and ancient folk songs.
Besides singers and musicians, four dancers take part in the performance, and they act as holy fools, demons and all other symbolic characters. And the main parts of the Demon, Tamara and her murdered fiancee are played by Oleg Menshikov, Natalia Shvets and Anatoly Beliy accordingly. The latter has already taken part in the productions both by Kirill Serebrennikov and Menshikov’s Theatrical Company 814. Menshikov as the Demon will hardly have wings and fly about the hall like David Copperfield, but obviously this company will make the spectators feel tingles down their spines.