In the end of April Oleg Menshikov will present his new work – “The Demon” by Lermontov. The performance is directed by Kirill Serebrennikov, one of the leaders of the modern directing.

– Kirill, why do you produce such a non-theatrical text?
– This a magic feeling: mysteriously getting inside of you, “The Demon” doesn’t let you go for a long time. We didn’t choose the play, but the play chose us. Only don’t think it is some devilry. It’s just a matter of the quality of the text.

– Is the story of the Demon and Tamara a true story or an allegory for you?
– For some reason, I have a feeling it really took place. This is a cosmic story with an elevated sense: about great passions and great events of the global meaning. At first I insisted at the genre of mystery, but then realized it has taken shape of a tale. Lermontov himself hints in the poem that “The Demon” is a scary tale for children.

– Will it result in a kind of religious performance?
– Of course, it is implied. Though Lermontov’s “Eastern Legend” is obviously a secular piece. And it is written by the poet not for religious reasons, but on the basis of a worldly experience enveloped into the mystical form. In one of the first versions, Lermontov uses the lines from Byron’s poem “Cain” as an epigraph, those where Lucifer talks to Cain. We also use this text in the performance.

– Are you familiar with the research works about “The Demon”?
– Yes, I am, but I don’t feel like being a captive of literature concepts. I am allergic to the book dust – both in literal and figurative meaning.

– Will Menshikov play the Demon?
– Yes, but rather an actor who starts to read the Demon’s lines. Anatoly Beliy plays Tamara’s fiancee and the Angel, and Natalia Shvets plays Tamara. There are also three lower spirits and two folk narrators. With their help the drama gradually turns into a folk ballad.

– Is Menshikov prepared for an experiment?
– Our production by all means is an experiment, but not for Oleg. Before “The Demon” he took up poetic theatre. He is a romantic hero, and knows how to work in this kind of theatrical character as nobody else.

– You promised to produce only modern plays.
– Unfaithfulness to modern plays is not the worst unfaithfulness that can be. Really, I want to remind the theatrical society that long before a wave of new drama overwhelmed Moscow, Menshikov had produced “Kitchen” by Maxim Kurochkin. It was a high-budget project for large audience. Not only he made a star out of a young writer, but he was able to prove that a modern play can attract crowds. It was a great profit for our theatre.

– Do you like the Caucasus?
– The events in our production take place not in the Caucasus. In the first versions of the poem the place is not determined at all; it’s just a story of a demon and a nun. “The Eastern Legend” is written by a certainly European man. The Caucasus for Lermontov is an abstract place on earth, far away from the world. The mountains are the scenery of the Eternity. “That man’s eternal discontent / Might not break in upon their slumber”. In our production, the Caucasus will be represented only by stones.

– I heard you had problems with stones.
– We tried to buy stones in a shop of goods for villas. But each stone there is priced from $20 to $30 there. And then I and the art-director went out of Moscow and dug the same stones out of the frozen sole at the side of the road.