' '

Oll. SoviET amJ.. EAST fuROPEAN

Volume 1, Number 3 October, 1981
EDITOR'S NOTE:
Permit me to express my gratitude for and gratification with the great
number of persons and institutions, in the United States and Canada, who have
expressed a strong interest in the NEWSNOTES. It has been my pleasure to add
you to our mailing lists. I am also grateful for the letters of encouragement I
have received from many of you.
As previously announced, I shall be happy to receive short articles, reviews,
announcements, bibliographical and pedagogical materials from you for
publication in subsequent issues of NEWSNOTES. Please remember, however, that
what you submit must be on the subject of Soviet and East European drama and
theatre.
I still have a number of copies of Volume 1, Number 2 on hand and will be
happy to send them to you at your requent, until the stock is depleted.
Leo Hecht
NEWSNOTES is a publication of the Institute for Contemporary Eastern European
Drama and Theatre under the auspices of the Center for Advanced Study in
Theatre Arts with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and
the Graduate School of George Mason University. The Institute office is Room
801, City University Graduate Center, 33 West 4Znd Street, New York, NY
10036. All subscription request (no charge) and submissions should be addressed to
the Editor of NEWSNOTES: Leo Hecht, Department of Foreign Languages and
Literatures, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia 22030.
1
ANNOUNCEMENTS
On August 10, 1981, Andre Sedriks of Trinity University, William Kuhlke of
the University of Kansas and Bela Kiralyfalvi of Wichita State University
presented a panel on contemporary Eastern European Drama at the American
Theatre Association national convention in Dallas, Texas. The panelists discussed
and gave information about the activities of the Institute, about recent and
upcoming publications, as well as several recent Polish and Soviet plays in English
translations.
The Wichita State University major theatre production series for 1981-82
will include a production of Never Part From Your Loved Ones by Aledsandr
Volodin {translation by Alma H. Law). Bela Kiralyfalvi will direct the production
to be performed on January 28-29-30, 1982.
The film n Akropolis, n a recording of an actual performance by J erzy
Grotowski's Polish Laboratory Theatre, may be purchased or rented from Arthur
Cantor, Inc., 234 West 44th Street, New York, NY 10036. Also obtainable from
the same source is n A Soldier's Tale, n adapted from Russian folklore, which
combines mime, and ballet set to a musical score by Igor Stravinsky.
The Center for Appeals for Freedom, Freedom House, 20 West 40th Street,
New York, NY 10018, informs us that their Lecture Bureau can furnish speakers
who are originally from the Soviet Union and whose area is the arts. Among them
are Sergei Dovlatov; Vitaly Komar; Alexander Melamid; Sophia Lubensky; Vladimir
Maximov; Vasily Aksyonov; Ernst Neizvestny; Mark Popovsky; Leonid Tarassu;
Esward Topol; and Tomas Venclova. Those interested should contact the Bureau
at the above address directly.
During your editor's stay in Budapest last June, he did not become aware of
a single performance of a Soviet play. The three new openings which were highly
propagated throughout the city were a play by Chekhov; a play by Mrozek; and a
new production of "Irma la Douce," which, I understand, is having phenominal box-
office success.
The Theatre de Rond Point in Paris was rehearsing a new dramatization of
Tolstoy's superb short story, "The Death of Ivan llich" last July. Although we
certainly wish them the best of luck, the new production seems to have some basic
faults which may cause it to fail. It is much too morbid and heavy. Unfortunately
it has chosen to eliminate most of Tolstoy's satirical and humorous moments and
centers upon the physical deterioration of a human being.
Oscar Swan, Department of Slavic Languages, Literature and Cultures,
University of Pittsburgh, reports that the University of Pittsburgh's Ad Hoc Polish
Drama Workshop presented Slawomir Mrozek's Na pelnym morzu (Out to Sea) on
April 10, 1981. The workshop was formed in response to undergraduate student
demand and was held under the supervision of Oscar Swan of the Slavic
Department. Directing the play was Gene Pawlikowski, a student who has won a
scholarship to study drama in Poland during 1981-82. To accommodate resources
at hand, the role of the Small Castaway, eventually eaten by the Fat and Medium
Castaways, was played by a woman, a change which the actors felt was an
improvement over the original. The new casting of this role created manifold
sexual overtones, fully exploited by the students and appreciated by the
z
audience. Since the performance was in Polish, longer speeches were streamlined
and the actors concentrated on developing an exaggerated Chaplinesque style, full
of visual innuendo, to which the play in any case lends itself. After a semester's
work, lines were delivered with near perfect precision, even if the verbal humor
was not always adequately appreciated by the audience. The play was attended by
around 60 people from the university and Pittsburgh community and generated
considerable enthusiasm for undertaking something similar next year.
Steve Grecco informs us that he is planning to make arrangements for a
visit and lecture tour in this country by the outstanding Polish playwright, Tadeusz
Rozewicz. This event is planned for the month of February, 198Z and will be
arranged out of The Pennsylvania State University. This is an excellent
opportunity for other institutions to make arrangements to have this important
visitor come to your location or campus without a great deal of expense. Those
interested in taking advantage of this opportunity please contact Dr. Stephen
Grecco, Department of English, College of the Liberal Arts, The Pennsylvania
State University, 117 Burrowes Building, University Park, PA 1680Z, or call him
at (814) 865-6381.
An international Symposium on the work of the Russian stage directory,
Vsevolod Meyerhold, will be held at the Culture House of Stockholm from
November 19-ZZ. The symposium is being organized by the Teater Schahrazad,
which in 1980 organized an international pedagogic research project "The Actor in
Group-Theatre." Information on the Symposium can be obtained by writing to:
Teater Schahrazad, Box ZZ545, 5-103 ZZ Stockholm, Sweden.
BOOKS
We are pleased to announce that Soviet Plays in Translation: An Annotated
Bibliography, is now available for sale. It was compiled and edited by Alma H.
Law and C. Peter Goslett and contains the contributions of twenty-five educators
in the field of Soviet theatre and drama. The book was prepared under the
auspices of the Institute for Contemporary East European Drama and Theatre of
the Center for Advanced Study in the Theatre Arts (CASTA) and was partially
funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. This
invaluable study contains a bibliography of Soviet plays with short plot outlines; an
index of translators with their addresses; a bibliography of articles on Soviet
theatre; and a bibliography of books on the Soviet theatre. This 100-page, large-
format publication may be obtained by mail for $3.50 ($4.50 outside the U.S.) to
cover printing, handling and mailing costs. Send a check or money order to
"Annotated Bibliography," CASTA Institute, Room 801, Graduate Center, 33 W.
4Znd Street, New York, NY 10036.
Russica Book and Art Shop, Inc. will gladly send catalogues of out-of-print
and antiquarian books on performing arts in the USSR to interested persons.
Please address requests to Valery Kuharets, Russica Book and Art Shop, Inc., 799
Broadway, New York, NY 10003.
For those who can read German, the following item may be of interest:
Fiebach, Joachim, ed. Sowjetische Regisseure ueber ihr Theater. Berlin:
Henschelverlag Kunst und Gesellschaft, 1976. This highly interesting book (Soviet
3
Directors Discuss
Tovstonogov, Ird,
Maibaliev.
Their
Panso,
Theatre),
Mambetov,
contains contributions
Liubimov, Goncharov,
by Okhlopkov,
Aledsidze and
Another interesting German book which discusses the major theatrical
products of the Polish playwright is the following: Bondy, Francois and J elenski,
Constantin. Witold Gombrowicz. Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1978.
Alma Law sent us a mini-review of the following recently published book:
Through the Magic Curtain: Theatre for Children, Adolescents and Young Adults
in the U.S.S. R. Miriam Morton, ed. and trans. New Orleans: Anchorage Press,
1979. The Soviet Union has a very well-developed professional theatre system for
children and teenagers that draws some 30 million spectators annually. Many
prominent playwrights and directors have gotten their start in these theatres
whose repertories include not only the expected fairytales for small children but a
rather sophisticated range of Russian and Western classiscs and contemporary
plays as well. In this book, originally published in Russian in 197Z, twenty-six
theatre professionals write on various apects of childrens theatre. The
contributions range from historical accounts of the early years by Natalya Stas
and Samuel Marshak to the experiences of such distinguished contemporary
theatre practitioners as directors Anatoly Efros and Maria Knebel and playwright
Victor Rozov.
SPECIAL REPORT
In May, 1981, the Theatre Arts Department, School of Creative Arts, San
Francisco State University presented five performances of Stanislaw Witkiewicz's
play "THEY." It was directed by Dr. Samuel Elkind. Sam has kindly agreed to
send us some of his thoughts and experiences and to inform us how rewarding the
opportunity was for him. In fact, he offered to direct the play on the East Coast
if asked. Here, then, are Sam's comments:
Without a doubt the play has an impact for a modern audience, particualrly
if they are "engaged" in the theatre process. If the audience sits in a darkened
house watching the dramatic action through the "fourth wall," some of the
immediacy may be lost. You see, I am talking about the contemporary staging of
"THEY," written in 19ZO, during which time Witkacy, troubled about future
automation, "pure form" in the theatre, modem art and his own sexuality,
attempts to put it all together in a play which starts out with a "Half-Act,"
followed by Act I and closing with Act n. In his Witkacian way he is parodying the
form and shape of theatre by writing several plays at the same time. Thus, we
start out with the action taking place in the hero's affluent "digs," which in this
case includes his priceless art collection including a Picasso and a spacious
ballroom. In his richly appointed surroundings he lives with his mistress Spika,
who is followed by her husband, long lost, Tefuan, an avowed enemy of the arts,
who is not only the writer of nonsense plays but the leader of a secret government
determined to put an end to the hero, Callisto Balandash, and all that he stands
for, including his love for avant-garde art, split personalities, and a hedonistic
life.
4
In short order, THEY appear, a polyglot collection of types, best described
as "looking even worse than the collection of blobs on the wall." THEY appear,
supported by soldiers with guns, who, in short order, dismantle Balandash's superb
art collection, after a rather complex twist of the plot in which Balandash
confesses to the murder of his mistress who has been killed while acting in a
comedia del arte play written by the mad Tefuan, who is her husband, Count
Tremendosa.
The play comes to a conclusion as the corpse is brought on stage and
Witkacy provides several brilliant speeches dealing with Nihilism.
In order to prepare college players it is best to delve deeply into the whole
notion of the Polish avant-garde. To that end, students read background material
including Witkacy's essay on "Pure Form," and the works of Gombrowicz and
Rozewicz (for the purpose of comparison). Moreover we looked at the
expressionist paintings of the twenties, we listened to Polish music starting with
Chopin and gradually moving to Szymanowski, Ludoslawski and Penderecki. We
looked at Witkacy's sketches. We read Dan Gerould's chapter on Witkacy which
will appear in a new book this fall. We looked at pictures of contemporary
productions of Polish stages and saw examples of Polish paintings and sculpture.
Some time was devoted to the exercises suggested by Grotowski, mainly of the
vocal variety. I conducted numerous exercises in improvisation, focusing on
techniques known as "transformations. n
We conducted long sessions in which actors were grilled and interviewed by
the cast. We worked and re-worked inner scenes within scenes in which Witkacy
slips in some highly compound and complex philosophies.
For staging the production we converted the 100-seat studio theatre into an
art gallery with statues throughout and numerous paintings according to Witkacy's
specifications. The actors, having the whole house in which to "move" did, in fact,
use the stairs leading down to the center stage, which had a floor painted to
resemble marble. When the soldiers arrived, they came right through the "house,"
- soldiers, in this case, were women wearing black and khaki outfits. And when
the art work is to be removed, they are aided by the "prop" crew, who, too, were
dressed the same way. Thus, at the end of Act I, they are moving pieces of art
right through the audience very effective, indeed.
Since Witkacy called for a masquerade ball beginning with Act II, we
created a fantasy ballet. The men and women (THEY) are dressed in black and
white and poised to execute a waltz (La Valse by Ravel), which quickly segues into
a track from Ludoslawski, in which the action of the second act is foreshadowed:
the dancers become automatons and commit a ritualistic murder, killing Spika and
carrying her off-stage as the servants rearrange the stage for the final action. In
fact the play shifts once again- for having started the Half Act as a sort of Noel
Coward comedy, moving to the somber tones of Pinter, it finally becomes
Witkacy, for he makes the most theatrical moment of the play and the most
realistic one, i.e., the staged entrance of Spika, dressed as a sylph, with grotesque
make-up. The funeral procession, underscored by Ludoslawski's soulful cello, leads
to the bizarre confession of both Ballandash and Tefuan for Spika's death. As
Tefuan turns berserk, the general, played as a harmless, humorous old man, takes
command and, having earlier slashed the one remaining Picasso, ends the play by
commanding the servants to find the coats so the THEY might leave.
5
The play ends as the two servants deliver some of the key speeches of the
play, underscored by the surrealistic sounds of Penderecki:
Marianna: Our poor mistress. Where is her soul if there is no other
world? She doesn't exist, she doesn' t exist at all. They have
taken the other world away from us and they haven't put a
new one in its place.
Fitty: There is no other world. I don't believe in anything myself.
And yet, it is hard to live, so terribly hard.
Fondoloff (the general, Michael! Joseph! Get our fur coats you devils!
An eerie, descending screech, suspended slowly, with flutes and clarinets, is
overpowered by basses with abrupt, harsh bowing The lights fade.
POUSH FILMS IN AMERICAN DISTRIBUTION
The following listing of feature films (and some shorts) is intended as a
service to organizations wishing to show Polish films in the United States. All
films are available on a rental basis. Listings are arranged by distributor, with
English title, Polish title, director and year or production.
Prospective exhibitors are cautioned to confirm availability of films with
the distributors, as well as to check on other necessary information. The films
listed are mostly in Polish with English subtitles, but some have no subtitles and a
few are in English or in English-dubbed versions. Prints may be available in
16mm, 35mm, one or the other only, or both. It is also advised to inquire of
distributors what other Polish films they may have; new films come into
distribution periodically, and some distributors do not maintain catalogs. For
these reasons, and others, this listing cannot be complete.
Prepared by Stephanie Doba, Director of Special Arts Projects, The
Kosciuszko Foundation, 15 East 65th Street, New York, NY 1002.1.
JANUS FILMS, 745 Fifth Ave., New York, N.Y. 1002.2. (212.-753-7100)*
Ashes and Diamonds
Kana!
A Generation
Barrier
Knife in the Water
Innocent Sorcerers
Popiq1 i diament
Kan<Jl
Pokol enie
Bariera
Noz w wodzie
Niewinni czarodziege
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
J erzy Skolimowski
Roman Polanski
Andrzej Wajda
NEW YORKER FILMS, 16 West 61st St. , New York, N. Y. 10023 (2.12-2.47-6110)
Identificatin Marks: None
Walkover
Rysopis
Walkower
J erzy Skolimowski
Jerzy Skolimowski
1958
1957
1954
1960
1961
1960
1964
1965
* Some of t he Janus collection is now being distributed by Films, Incorporated. Call
212-889-7910.
6
Everything for Sale
Landscape After Battle
W szystko na sprzedaz
Krajobraz po bitwie
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
1968
1970
AUDIO-BRANDON Fll..MS, 34 MacQuesten Pkwy. South, Mt. Vernon, N.Y. (914-664-5051)**
Birchwood
Samson
Hunting Flies
Siberian Lady Macbeth
Family Life
Pearl in the Crown
Mother Joan of the Angels
The Third Part of the Night
The Passenger
Border Street
Eve Wants to Sleep
Sal to
Jovita
Cul-de-Sac
Short cartoons by various directors
Brzezina
Samson
Polowanie na muchy
Siberska Ledi Magbet
Zycie rodzinne
PelT'la w koronie
Matka Joanna od aniq1ow
Trzecia czesc nocy
Pasazerka
Ulica graniczna
Ewa chce spac
Sal to
Jowita
(in English)
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Wajda
Krzysztof Zanussi
Kazimierz Kutz
Jerzy Kawalerowicz
Andrzej Zulawski
Andrzej Munk
Aleksander Ford
Tadeusz Chmielewski
Tadeusz Konwicki
Janusz Morgenstern
Roman Polanski
1970
1961
1969
196Z
1971
1971
1961
1973
1963
1948
1958
1966
1967
1966
AMERPOL ENTERPRISE Fll..MS, 11601 Jos. Campau, Detroit, MI 4821Z (313-365-6780)
The Wedding
Eroica
How To Be Loved
Countess Cosel
The Peasants
All Friends Here
Hell and Heaven
Descent to Hell
Alone in the City
Let's Love Sirens
Marriage of Convenience
The Wall of Witches
The Shot
The Twilight of Sorcerers
Others
Wesele
Eroica
J ak bye kochana
Hrabina Cosel
C}J1opi
Sami swoi
Piel91o i niebo
Zejscie do pie1<1b
Sam posrod miasta
Kochajmy syrenki
Menstwo z rozsadku
Sciana C zarownic
Wystrz<Ji
Zmierzch czarownikow
Andrzej Wajda
Andrzej Munk
Wojciech Has
J erzy Antczak
Jan R ybkowski
Syl wester Checinski
t a n i ~ w Rozewicz
Zbigniew Kuzminski
Hanna Bielinska
Jan Rutkiewicz
t a n i ~ w Bareja
?
Jerzy Antczak
?
HENRY MICHALSKI, Z45 Lyncrest Rd., Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 0763Z (201-871-4514)
Colonel Wolodyjowski
The Ring of Duchess Ann
Pan W q1odyjowski
Pierscien Ksieznej Anna
J erzy Hoffman
Maria Kaniewska
197Z
1957
196Z
1968
1973
1967
1966
1966
1965
1967
1967
?
1965
?
1968
1971
** For theatrical showings of most of these films, the distributor is: International Film
Exchange, 159 West 53rd Street., New York, N.Y. 10019 (Z1Z-58Z-4318).
7
The Adventure with a Song
The Case of Pilot Maresz
I Don't Like Mondays
King Boleslaw the Bold
Man-Woman Wanted
A Stake Greater Than Life
Woodpecker
Others
Przygoda z piosenka
Sprawa pilota Maresza
Nie Lubie
Smi$y
Poszukiwany-Poszukiwana
Stawka wieksza niz zycie
Dzieciq1
Bareja
Leonard Buczkowski
Tadeusz Chmielewski
Witold Lesiewicz
Bareja
Janusz Morgenstern/
Andrzej Konic
?
LISZKA ATTRACTIONS, 11 Carter Oak Ave. , Hartford, CT 06106 (203-2.49-62.55)
Bad Luck
Lokis
The Doll
The Structure of Crystals
Others
Zezowate szczescie
Lokis
Lalka
Struktura Krysztcyb
And.rzej M unk
Janusz Majewski
Wojciech Has
Krzysztof Zanussi
1969
1956
1971
1972
1973
1969
?
1960
1970
1968
1969
SAN FRANCISCO RESEARCH GROUP, P.O. Box 15007, San Francisco, CA 94115 (415-346-9216)
Taste of the Black Earth
Top Dog
The Sandglass
Sol ziemi czarnej
Wodzirej
Sanatorium pod klepsydra
Kazimierz Kutz
Feliks Falk
Wojciech Has
WALTER E. WAISMANN, 2925 W. Bryn Mawr Ave., Chicago, IL 60659 (312-878-3139)
The Leper
Big Deal (Love it or Leave it)
Hubal
Others
Tredowata
Kochaj albo rzuc
Hubal
?
?
Bohdan Poreba
BAUER INTERNATIONAL, 695 West 7th St., Plainfield, NJ 07060 (201-757-6099)
illumination lluminacja Krzysztof Zanussi
JOSEPH GREEN, 200 West 58th St., New York, N.Y. 10019 (ZlZ-246-9343)
1970
1977
1972
?
?
1973
1973
The Pharoah Faraon Jerzy Kawalerowicz 1965
LIGHTHOUSE FILMS, 162 Galley Ave., Toronto, Ont. M6R Z.L2, Canada (416-532-532.6)
The Deluge Po top Jerzy Hoffman 1974
8
NORMAN CALDWELL, 31d/2Minor Ave. North, Seattle, WA 98019 (206-682-4318)
The Saragossa Manuscript Rekopis znalexiony w Saragossie W oj ciech Has
VIEWFINDERS, INC., P.O. Box 1665, Evanston, II.. 60204 (312-869-0600)
Shorts:
Two Men and a Wardrobe
Mammals
The Fat and the Lean
Labyrinth (animation
Dwaj ludzie z szafa
Ssaki
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski
Jan Lenica
PHOENIX FILMS, 470 Park Avenue South, New York, N.Y. 10016 (212-684-5910)
Adam II (animation)
Moving Pictures, the Art of Jan Lenica
Other short animated cartoons:
Landscape
The Rose
The Changeling
The Incident
Jan Lenica
Richard P. Rogers
Lenica
Piotr Szpakowicz
Bronislaw Zeman
Franciszek Pyter
1964
1958
1963
1976
1975
1975
1979
1975
1975
McGRAW-HILL FILMS, 1221 Avenue of the Americas, New York, N.Y. 10020 (212-997-6168)
Yellow Slippers (animation)
Rhinoceros (short, animation
?
Jan Lenica
?
?
TINC PRODUCTIONS, INC., 415 East 52nd St., New York, N.Y. 10022 (212-832-8749)
Land of Promise
A Woman's Decision
Camouflage
Story of Sin
Ziemia obiecana
Bilans kwartalny
Barwy ochronne
D ziege grzechu
POLISH FILMS WITHOUT AMERICAN DISTRIBUTION
Andrzej Wajda
Krzysztof Zanussi
Krzysztof Zanussi
W alerian Borowczyk
1975
1975
1977
1975
Prints of some new and classic films with no American distributors are kept in care of the Polish
Embassy and Consulates, and showings may be arranged on a loan basis.
Polish Consulate
23 3 Madison Ave
New York, NY 10016
(212-889-8360)
Polish Consulate
1530 N. Lakeshore Dr.
Chicago, IL 60610
(312-337-8166)
9
Polish Embassy; Cultural Affairs
2640 16th St., NW
Washington, DC 20009
(202-234-3800)
REVIEW
Earlier this year, the Soviet film "Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears" won
the academy award for best foreign film of the year. It is now being shown in
theaters all over the United States. Prof. Alan Kreizenbeck of St. Mary's College
of Maryland was kind enough to write the following review of the film for
NEWSNOTES:
"Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears"
It is tempting to accuse Valentin Chionykh, scriptwriter for "Moscow
Doesn't Believe in Tears," of mawkishness. The opening shots of fog shrouded
Moscow, accompanied by romantic sounding guitar and vocals, establishes a
sentiment that the film's narrative develops, expands, and finally, milks. It is also
tempting to dismiss the work of director Vladimir Menshov-particularly his
camera work, particularly the zoom lens shots-as trite and irritating.
But this film was not created for an American audience, an audience raised
on film and television, one that through osmosis knows good film making from
bad. While most Americans don't know Eisenstein from Liechtenstein
9
enough
acetate has passed in front of their eyes to create fairly sophisticated-if not
always well verbalized-attitudes toward film. To an American film-goer,
"Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears" seems like a 1930's script (minus the humor)
shot by a beginning film student.
But the movie is intended for such an audience. It was produced for a
Russian one, very similar in class, educational background, and outlook to the
young heriones of its story-namely lower, rudimentary and naive. And like the
heroines, with little knowledge of cinematic art.
This is not to say the film is not interesting or valuable for American
viewers. As a reflection or representation of Soviet life, it has merit. The
episodes presented often offer fascinating glimpses of a culture and a way of
ordering the world that many Americans know very little about. Scenes are
presented, for example, in which the successful head (a woman) of a large
manufacturing concern (3,000 employees) sleeps on a sofa bed in the living room; a
sensitive Soviet man is depicted as one who will cook, but not do the dishes; and a
young couple is admonished by their peers for snuggling in public. Often, the
settings are more interesting-from a sociological point of view-than the scenes
which take place in them. Contrasting a favored professional person's apartment
to a dormitory for young working women, for example, bespeaks much about the
continuance of egalitarianism in Soviet society. Scenes inside factories, bakeries,
and dry cleaners tell more about a nation rushing full bore (and somewhat
clumsily) into industrialization than any number of graphs, reports, or five-year
plans. The parts, in short, are much more interesting than the whole.
The movie tells the story of three women and how their lives change over a
twenty year period. In 1958 the three-Katerina, Tonya, and Ludimilla-alllive in
a working women's residence hall in Moscow. Each has come to the "big city" to
escape the provincial life of the village. Katerina has come to study, Tonya to
work, and Ludimilla, well, her most characterizing line is "Moscow's a lottery.
You can win the grand prize."
10
Although the movie follows the lives of the three characters, it centers on
Katerina. She is seduced by a television cameraman, has his child out of wedlock,
manages (by 1980) to raise the baby to teenagedom and herself to a position of
power in the manufacturing world. At age forty, she meets Mister Right, a man
who does what he likes (another interesting social comment), and after some
tribulation, the audience is left with the assumption that they will live happily
ever after.
Somewhat reminiscent of "An Unmarried Woman," it differs in the
important respect that the Jill Clayburgh charcter chooses to reject her lover and
have a go of it on her own, while Katerina becomes hysterically unfunctional when
her errant lover momentarily disappears and must rely on her friends to bring him
back to "his senses" and to her. "Moscow Doesn't Believe in Tears" seems to say
that a modern Soviet woman (talented, decisive, strong) is still a woman
(dependent on a man's love for happiness). There is much more to say about the
social nuances in the film, particularly about those related to the classes in the
classless Soviet society; perhaps the best advice I can offer is to see the movie for
its detail-ignore the forest, look at the trees.
SPECIAL REPORT
The following U!>"'date on the activities of Jerzy Grotowski was submitted
by Dr. Robert Findlay, University Teatre, University of Kansas:
"Grotowski in 1981"
Polish director Jerzy Grotowski was in New York on 20 May to appear at a
benefit for Jacek one of his company members who has been
undergoing treatment during the past year a Sloan-Kettering Hospital. The
benefit occurred at Hunter College and opened with a film of Vigil, a
paratheatrical event conducted by After the film, Grotowski's
remarks in French were translated into English by American director Andre
Gregory.
Grotowski discussed the structure of Vigil, a work that makes no
distinctions between performers and spectators. Now that Grotowski has himself
moved on from paratheatrical work into what now must be considered theatre
anthropology, he was capable of being almost clinical in discussing Vigil. He spoke
of specific strategies used by the "leaders" of the event in inducing the
participation of those who came from the outside. Interestingly enough, it is
really the outsider whom Grotowski perceived as dictating the specifics of the
event while the leaders provided the general form. If the outsiders are static, the
leaders will "stimulate the space," said Grotowski, but in no way would the l eaders
force the outsiders to do anything. Gradually the outsiders, presumable feeling
free to do what they will, reach a level of creative inspiration that they would not
if guided too strongly by the leaders.
Later in a question-and-answer period, Grotowski spoke also of his most
recent project, Theatre of Sources, which involves a great number of cross-
cultural interactions in various parts of the world. Since 1977, Grotowski has been
11
working with a group of thirty-six people from such cultures as Africa, India,
Mexico, Europe, and North America. Typically Grotowski was mystifying in
speaking of what he calls the
11
absurd objective
11
of this work, that being the
discovery of what he calls
11
the pure man.
11
Presumably this "pure man
11
is one
who, stripped of the programming of his or her own culture, is capable of
perceiving the world purely, more directly, more immediately. To be sure,
Grotowski may seem a great distance from the kind of work he was doing in the
period of the 1960s with such performances as Akropolis, The Constant Prince,
and Apocalypsis cum figuris. Still, there are strangely parallel connections
between his earlier struggle for what he called
11
the holy actor
11
and what he now
refers to as
11
the pure man.
11
Both are ideal abstractions, absurdities, to use
Grotowski's own designation-but nonetheless practical ends toward which to
work.
SPECIAL REPORT
The Moscow Theatre of Satire
The Theatre of Satire was formed in 1924, during the NEP period, and
became quite a favorite of the Moscow theatre-going public due to its
performances of rather incisive comedies of writers like Erdman, who later
disappeared from the scene during Stalin. In the 1930's and 40's the theater turned
to
11
safer" performances of folk- dramas of limited artistic quality. After the
death of Stalin it did a complete about-face with the appointment of Valentin N.
Pluchek as the director-producer of the theater. Pluchek was born in 1909 and
had a successful career as an actor before he turned to directing. He was one of
the last pupils of Meierhold in the latter's experimental studio in the late 1920's.
In 1939 he formed an experimental stage together with the playwright Arbuzov,
based on his experience with Meierhold. He produced a play which was a
combination of improvizations and was entitled
11
A City at Dawn.
11
In 1941
Pluchek was assigned as the director of the theatre of the fleet. After the war he
worked as a free-lance director for various stages until he became the director of
the Theatre of Satire, a position which he holds to this day.
Imagine my suprise when I arrived in Hamburg, Germany on June ZZ, 1981,
and saw a large poster in front of the Deutsches Schauspielhaus, one of the major
German stages, announcing the one-time guest appearance that same evening of
the Moscow Theatre of Satire. They were to perform Bertolt Brecht's "Three-
Penny Opera.
11
Of course, I immediately purchased tickets.
The Soviet cast of 35 was headed by the top performers of the theatre,
including A. A. Mironov (Macheath); S. W. Mishulin (Jonathan Peachum); Z. N.
Zelinskaia (Celia Peachum); and M. M. Derzhavin (Chief of Police). In addition
Hamburg was host to an entire production crew of approximately twenty Soviets,
including the musical director, lighting and prop technicians, choreographers and
costumers. The entire group was headed by Pluchek himself who was on stage
after the performance and literally basked in the thunderous applause the SRO
house showered upon him.
Until Stalin's death, the Soviets had an ambivalent attitude towards
Brecht. Of course, his politics had a number of positive points, but his dramatic
theory was definitely not what the Russians were used to, and his occasionally
lZ
iconoclastic nature made him dangerous. Most of these objections were removed
when Brecht was presented the Stalin Prize (it was not re-named until the
following year) in 1954, with a presentation speech by Boris Pasternak who
despised Brecht but was forced to cooperate. After this event Brecht became
"performable." Liubimov presented "The Good People of Sezuan" in Moscow in the
Meierhold tradition; Sturua in Tbilisi directed the "Caucasian Chalk Circle" in the
tradition of the folk theatre.
The German audience was extremely impressed with Pluchek's version of an
all-familiar Brecht musical-drama which they had seen all too often and of which
they had gotten somewhat tired. Most of them had forgotten how marvellously
theatrical the play is, and had gone to see it purely for the amusing "songs" of
Kurt Weill. The staging by the Soviets was quite unexpectedly different. It
premiered in Moscow in January, 1981 and was transported to Hamburg in exactly
the same version. Primary emphasis was equally placed on the entertainment of
the play and also on its socio-political message. A great deal of attention was
paid to details which brought out the frictions between the characters, satirical
elements, corruption, thirst for power and the downtrodden masses who must
lower themselves to behave anti-socially. Nevertheless the play was extremely
enjoyable and very well performed. Of course, only a handful of persons in the
large audience understood Russian. In fact, many thought that it would be
performed in German and were quite taken aback when they heard the first strains
of Meki nozh. Nevertheless they all knew the German text so well that the
foreign language was not a deterrent to their enjoyment.
L. Hecht
SPECIAL REPORT
The following article was written for us by Alan Smith on the plane from
New York to the USSR where he will be spending the entire year. We are grateful
to him:
The "Little Theatre"
An interesting recent development in Soviet drama has been the emergence
of "little theatre."
The staging of small scale, experimental intimate plays on the so-called
"little stage" has become a means of inexpensively trying out new material and
broadening the repertoire of some of Moscow's leading theatres.
Efros's theatre on Malaya Bronnaya has recently staged a production of
Shelagh Delaney's Taste of Honey. The Mossovet Theatre has both a "theatre in
the foyer" where it has presented a play on the life of Edith Pia (though not the
production recently seen in London and New York) and also a separate little
theatre whose repertoire at present consists of three plays: a comedy by
Saltykov-Shchedrin The Death of Pazukhin; Radzinski's Does Love Exist? The
Firemen Ask- the love story of a cynical young man and a quirky girl, reminiscent
of his 104 Pages About Love; and If I Will Be Living, a dramatization of the
relationship between Leo Tolstoy and his wife.
13
Based on Tolstoy's fiction, diaries and correspondence the play outlines the
conflict between Tolstoy's desire to free himself of the spiritual burden and
embarrassment of his wealth and position and Sophia Andreevna's fears for the
security of her family. Two established actors of the Mossovet company play the
leads: S. Kokovkin both wrote the play and stars as Tolstoy while N. Tenyakova
plays Sophia. The evening really belongs to her. Her performance is so strong and
affecting that she wins the audience's sympathy; Tolstoy emerges as unreasonable
and querrulous. The play is directed by A. Kazantsev, a young playwright now
making his mark with two promising plays on the breakdown of family
relationships.
The Mayakovsky Theatre opened its season on the little stage with a
production of Coburn's The Gin Game, featuring two of its veteran players
Samoilov and Karpova as Weber and Fonsia. Samoilov's performance was
adequate, though it lacked the bravura and idiosyncracy of the creator of the role
Hume Cronyn. Karpova, on the other hand, was woefully miscast and misdirected,
playing Fonsia as crude, loud-mouthed and uncouth, so that the climactic moment
of her fury at Weber reducing her to swearing, totally loses its significance. A
final incongruity was the "staging" - essentially a black-walled acting area,
indescript furniture and a floor strewn with capitalist garbage expressly solicited
from the American Embassy.
The Moscow Art Theatre was thankful that it had a production on its little
stage in time to replace its intended gift to the XXVIth Party Congress. Shatrov's
I Bequeath To You, the playwright's speculation on what occured on a day Lenin
spent along in the Kremlin shortly before his death, was deemed politically flawed
and attention now turned to an unusual play by a prolific young playwright
Alexander Remez. Rather than featuring Lenin, however, the playwright details
the progress of his brother Alexander Ulyanov from conscience-stricken liberal to
political terrorist and would-be assassin. Lenin appears only as his hot-blooded
and impatient younger brother.
The play is directed by A. Vasiliev, the latest sensation in the directorial
ranks, who was briefly connected with the Stanislawski Theatre and whose
productions of Gorky's Vassa Zheleznova and Slavkin's Grown-up Daughter of a
Young Man have occasioned much excitement. The director creates the bright
and airy spaciousness of a well-to-do Russian home in the provinces at the end of
the century, with a minimal setting: a meticulously set dinner table and buffet
around which a good deal of the action takes place, and a long polished wooden
balustrade on the other side of the stage. He elicits performances of great
naturalness from his cast, particularly from Yu. Bogatyrev as the father and I.
Akulova as the mother, while D. Brusnikin still only a third year student at the
MXAT school, is most impressive as the young Alexander.
Mark Rogovsky's production of Kafka-Father and Son was originally coupled
with Capek's Mother, but the latter play was subsequently dropped. Set in a very
elaborately recreated period living room with striking lighting effects, the play
depicts the battle between a domineering father and a weak-willed son both of
whom prove in need of love yet are incapable of displaying affection for one
another. Despite the advance publicity and great curiosity among the Moscow
intelligentsia about the first production of Kafka, the play turned out to be rather
predictable despite fine performances by Zhelobov as the son and A. Popov as the
father.
14
Further small stage productions include a possible presentation of Equus.
On the main stage the Moscow Art Theatre's repertoire, while still paying
tribute to its mainstays Chekhov and Gorky, has also ventured into modern
drama. Amongst the current productions are Roshchin's Old New Year and three
plays (and possibly a fourth) by Alexander Gelman. Gelman has revitalized the
rather overworked genre of the production play which previously varied the
changes on the themes of the communist ideal, the motivation of reluctant
personnel, and the triumph over backslackers, spies or saboteurs. Gelman,
however, poses new relevant moral problems and pursues them to an extent
previously unthinkable or permissible. Usually, his heroes stand up against some
widely accepted situation or injustice and oppose it, shattering complacency and
challenging the status quo. Even when the injustice is seemingly redressed, one is
made to feel that the situation will soon return to its previous state. Those in
power with vested interests often prove too strong for the reformers.
Thus in A Part Meeting an emergency session is called to discuss a brigade's
refusal of a bonus when it discovers that the production plan has been falsified by
the management. The Party secretary and finally the director of the building
trust decide to redress the wrong and accede to the workers' demands for an
investigation, even if it means their own removal for mismanagement. In We, the
Undersigned, however, the ending is not so sanguine. The play is set entirely on a
train (a breathtakingly real set by Leventhal) and recounts the efforts of an
apparently shady character, Lenya, to persuade a commission to change its mind
over the rejection of an inferior building project. It transpires, however, that he
is attempting to save the career of his boss, a truly honest man, who is being
victimized by a corrupt higher official. Justice does not triumph here, alas.
Though the honest commission-head vows not to let the matter rest - knowing as
he does he was selected for the commission because the powers above knew how
he would respond - both he and Lenya - brillantly played by the fine actor
Kalyagin - seem powerless before the wiles of those in power. The play closes
with a powerful image of the train bearing down, headlight glaring like a
juggernaut on the hapless figures of Lenya and his wife blindly stumbling over the
tracks.
In the third play, Feedback, the bureaucracy struggles to prevent the
surfacing of its errors and the apportionment of the blame for the premature
commissioning of a production line whose safety regulations prevent the further
expansion and completion of the plant. Each group denies its responsibility and
blames its rival. Eventually when the Party secretary discovers the truth, it is too
late to avert enormous financial losses; the guilty party hints that he will not be
out of favor long and that perhaps the Party secretary's days are numbered. Far
from rosy optimism, Gelman's work - a fusion of drama and publicistics, takes a
hard look at certain aspects of industrial life and cries out for change. The
laborynth-like nature of the power struggle is strikingly realized in a magnificent
set by the Czech designer Josef Svoboda: a soaring pyramid of desks and
passageways disappearing at its apex into the depths of the stage and disturbingly
interlocked with the incessant jingle of telephones. In his late work Gelman
appears to be moving towards more intimate personal concerns such as the
relationships between man and wife. The social theme is still present, but in the
background as a determining factor upon human conduct.
15
/
Dept. of Foreign Langs & Lits
George Mason University
Fairfax, Virginia 22030
Non-Profit Organization
US Postage Paid
Fairfax, Vi r ginia
Permit No. 1532