This is a play that is no longer slighted by those who have nothing better to do. It eventually became noticeable that the criticism was always the same - everybody would remark on the indistinctness and weakness of the dramaturgy coupled with the unevenness of the acting. But in the end all the hullabaloo confirms just one thing: "The Kitchen," by Maxim Kurochkin and directed by Oleg Menshikov, has become a phenomenon in Moscow's theater world.
The technique of combining time and space in dramatic art and the intricate interweaving of ultra-modern reality with a medieval epic at first renders you completely nonplussed, forcing you to strain your brain to follow the playwright's thoughts. Once that has been achieved then everything suddenly becomes extremely simple. For some reason you are not surprised by the fact that some of the characters bear the names of ancient knights and kings while the remainder change theirs in the course of events while not even changing their apparel. A modern kitchen installed in an ancient castle becomes easily believable, making you recall old films about underground laboratories belonging to alchemists and wizards (and when is a kitchen not a laboratory?) in which strange substances were made and the past and the future become one. Which is actually what happens in "The Kitchen."
Passing through the centuries, you meet Prince Siegfried (Nikita Tatarenkov), his beloved wife Krimkhilda (Oksana Mysina) and his alter ego, his best friend and worst enemy, King Gunther (Oleg Menshikov). In the kitchen, between the saucepans and the table, among hilarious squabbles between the cooks and the waiters, under the gloomy gaze of the supervisor Khagen (Alexei Gorbunov) deep passions simmer. What is especially interesting is the psychological duel between Siegfried and Gunther. It comes about because the former wants to be first without making any effort to get there while the latter is doomed to be eternally in second place, a fact to which he refuses to be reconciled. In addition to everything else, they love the same woman - Krimkhilda. However, Gunther's tragedy is that even after having destroyed his rival, he is not in a position to change his fate. The adored Krimkhilda will, as centuries before, heap on his head terrible curses and thirst for his death and, since his milieu turns out to be too weak to defend him, he remains face to face with his own terrible loneliness.
The theme of the brilliant and solitary person who is deprived of love despite the admiration of the public is close to Menshikov's heart. He directs and plays himself in a deeply personal way, doing it, as always, wonderfully well. Many of the actors in "The Kitchen" do not come up to his level but it in no way hinders the production for, in this case, the followers make the king. Even if he is a murderer.

Submitted by Kay