Soviet

and
:Bast-European
!):ram a, Theatre
and
F :ilm
VOLUME 7, NUMBER 1
MAY, 1987
SEEDTF 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, Graduate Center, City University of
New York with support from the National Endowment
for the Humanities and the Graduate School and the
Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures of
George Mason University. The Institute Office is
Room 801, City University Graduate Center, 33 West
42nd Street, New York, NY 10036. All subscription
requests and submissions should be addressed to the
Editor of SEEDTF: Leo Hecht, Department of
Foreign Languares and Literatures, George Mason
University, Fairfax, VA 22030. (Proofreading
Editor: Prof. Rhonda Blair, Hampshire College
Theatre, Amherst, MA 01002.)
George Mason University
SEEDTF has a very liberal reprinting policy. Journals and news-
letters which desire to reproduce articles, reviews and other mate-
rials which have appeared in SEEDTF may do so, as long as the
following provisions are met:
a . Permission to reprint must be requested from SEEDTF in writ-
. ing bdore the fact.
b. Credit to SEEDTF must be given in the reprint.
c. Two copies of the publication in which the reprinted material
has appeared must be furnished to the Editor of SEEDTF im-
mediately upon publication.
2
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Editorial Policy ... ........ 4
Announcements ... ........... 5
Bibliography ........... ?
Soviets to Show Western Films .... . 8
"Tarkovskii: A Tribute" .
by Leo Hecht .................... 9
"Nikita Mikhalkov's Revisionist
Oblomov" by
Peter G. Christensen. .... 11
"New Direction at the Ermolova
Theatre" by Elena Sokol .. 2.5
"Tymo t eus z Rymc imc i"
by Jan Wilkowski .......... 36
"Soviet-American Cooperation in
Film Studies and Production:
Achievements and Prospects:
by Anna Lawton .... 41
"Jewish Themes on the Moscow
Stage" by Leo Hecht ...... 46
3
EDITORIAL POUCY
Manuscripts in the following categories are
solicited: articles of no more than 2, 500 words; book
reviews; performance reviews; and bibliographies. It
must be kept in mind that all of the above sub-
missions must concern themselves either with
contemporary materials on Soviet or East European
theatre and drama, new approaches to older
materials in recently published works, and new
performances of older plays. In other words, we
would welcome submissions reviewing innovative
performances of Gogo! or recently published books on
Gogo!, for example, but we could not use original
articles discussing Gogo! as a playwright.
Although we welcome translations of articles
and reviews from foreign publications, we do require
copyright release statements.
We will also gladly publish announcements of
special events, new book releases, job opportunities
and anything else which may be of interest to our
discipline. Of course all submissions are evaluated by
blind readers on whose findings acceptance or re-
jection is based.
All submissions must be typed double-spaced
and carefully proofread . Submit two copies of each
manuscript and attach a stamped, self-addressed
envelope. The MLA style should be followed. Trans-
literations should follow the Library of Congress
system. Submissions will be evaluated, and authors
will be notified after approximately four weeks.
All submissions, inqUiries and subscription
requests should be directed to:
Prof. Leo Hecht, Editor
Dept. of Foreign Languages & Literatures
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA 22030
4
ANNOUNCEMENTS
January 13, 1987 marked the passing of Anatolii
Efros, the managing producer/ director of the
Taganka Theatre in Moscow, of a heart attack, at the
age of 61. His first major post was as the chief
artistic director of the Lenin Komsomol Theatre,
from which he was fired in 1967. He was at first
transferred to a minor Moscow theatre but soon
surfaced at the Malaia Bronnaia Theatre. In 1978 he
came to Minneapolis to produce The Marriage by
Nikolai Gogol at the Tyrone Guthrie Theatre. Efros
accepted the position at the Taganka after Iurii
Liubimov refused to return from an extended stay in
the west. Efros was maligned by many for
attempting to fill Liubimov's shoes and thereby
condoning the government's attacks on the latter. He
had a difficult time running the Taganka because of
the loyalty of the staff for Liubimov, the defection
of many of the best members of the ensemble to film
c:md television, and lack of support by the Moscow
theatre-going intelligentsia -- despite the fact that
the Taganka is still sold out for every performance,
even mediocre ones. At the time of this writing, no
decision has yet been published by the authorities as
to a successor.
Sponsored by the Friends School in Baltimore,
MD, a Russian Film Festival took place at the
Baltimore Museum of Art in November, 1986. Films
shown included Manly Upbringing (Muzhskoe
Vospitanie), 1983; Flying in Dreams and Life (Polety
vo sne i naiavu), 1983; Scarecrow (Chuchelo), 1983;
Taught Kids (Patsan_yl, 1983; In Love By His Own
Choice (Vliublen po sobstvennomu 1983;
and Boris Godunov, 1985.
The extremely successful run at the Arena
Stage, Washington, D.C., of Dostoevskii's Crime and
Punishment as directed by Iurii Liubimov and
translated by Michael Heim, with program notes by
Alma Law, was extended through March 8. A special
NEH-funded seminar entitled "The Psychic Split:
5
Dostoevskii's Crime and Punishment" was held at the
Kreeger. Theatre. The panel, moderated by Alma
Law, consisted of Joseph Frank, Michael Heim and
Peter Sellars.
During this past year your editor has been
frequently asked to include sources of video cassettes
of Soviet and East European films in SEEDTF. This
has been done in previous issues. A new source, a
very important one, is hereby added: Ark's
intervideo, 545 Ortega Street, San Francisco, CA
94122, Tel: (415) They specialize in Soviet
films. The price of "one series" film cassettes (i.e.
normal length feature films} is $35 Their catalog,
which is in Russian and WtfortWtately does not
contain the names of the directors nor years of
release, contains 235 entries. It will be sent to you
upon request.
Negotiations for an increase in cui tural
exchanges between the Soviet Union and the United
States are continuing at an accellerated pace. This
year's schedule is still being arranged. It already
includes pianist Lazar Berman's recitals at the
Kennedy Center in February and four different
ballets to be performed by the Bolshoi ballet, also at
the Kennedy Center, in July. Also, on the same
stage, in October, the Leningrad Symphony Orchestra
will perform with violinist Pavel Kogan and, again,
Lazar Berman. That same month the Moscow
Virtuosi, a string quartet, will also be at the Kennedy
Center. The Soviet Embassy is also hoping to arrange
a Washington visit by the Georgian State Dancers.
6
BmUOGRAPHY
Jacques Aumont. Montage Eisenstein.
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987.
Available in cloth or paper.
Daniel J. Goulding. Liberated Cinema: The Yugoslav
Experience. Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 1985.
Boris Schwarz. Music and Musical Life in Soviet
Russia. Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1983. Drama Contemporary: Czechoslovakia.
New York: PAJ Publications, 1986. Contains
the following plays:
Jacques and His Master by Milan
Kundera.
Protest by Vaclav Havel.
Games by Ivan Klima.
Fire in the Basement by Pavel Kohout.
Detour by Pavel Landovsky.
The Blue Angel by Milan Uhde.
Annette Michelson (ed.). Kino-Eye: The Writings of
Dziga Vertov. University of California Press,
1987.
Michael Green (ed. & trans!.). The Russian Symbolist
Theatre: An Anthology of Plays and Critical
Texts. Ann Arbor: Ardis, 1986.
Konstantin Rudnitsky. Meyerhol d the Director. Ann
Arbor: Ardis, 1981.
Yury Olesha. The Complete Plays. Edited and
translated by M. Green and J. Katsell. Ann
Arbor: Ardis, 1983.
Ellendea Proffer (ed.). Nikolai Evreinov: A Pictorial
Biography. Ann Arbor: Ardis, 1981.
7
Stanialow Wyspianski. The Wedding. Transl. by
Gerard T. Kapolka. Ann Arbor: Ardis, 1987.
Vladimir Vysotsky. In Memoriam. These are sets of
records available through Ardis. Included is a
set of Vysotsky's performance as Hamlet at the
Taganka and another set of some of his other
performances at the Taganka.
International Historic Films, Inc., P.O. Box 29035,
Chicago, ll.. 60629, issues a catalog of
videocassettes in which they list numerous
contemporary Soviet propaganda films.
Soviets to Show Western FUms
Soviet movie fans will be able to see films by
Federico Fellini, Milos Forman and other major
western directors following a shake-up in the state
film hierarchy, a leading Soviet filmmaker
announced.
Elem Klimov, head of the Soviet filmmakers
union, told reporters that Soviet authorities had
bought all of Fellini's films and would start by
showing "La Dolce Vita," a 1959 tale of society life in
Rome. He said it was also planned to show Czech-
born Forman's Academy Award-winning "One Flew
Over the Cuckoo's Nest" and "Amadeus." "We are
going to show the best films by the best directors,
which was not the case previously," said Klimov, who
is in Paris for the French premiere of his "Farewell
to Matiora."
Hitherto, Moscow authorities have favored
western films that were cheap to buy, inoffensive to
Soviet taste or those that portrayed the West in a
damaging light. Klimov said cost was still a key
factor, and that Moscow had found Steven Spielberg's
"E.T." too expensive.
Soviet cinema has undergone a revolution since
Klimov was elected to lead the filmmakers' uni on in
8
May, with banned films being released an he role of
the all-powerful Goskino cinema authority cut back.
Klimov rejected suggestions that the new
freedom of Soviet filmmakers to work outside the
Goskino monopoly would bring them into conflict
with the Kremlin. "Of all the films which were left
on the shelf, non was anti-Soviet," he said. "It just
suited someone to declare them anti-Soviet, either
out of excessive caution or because they did not fit
required stereotypes."
TARKOVSK.U: A TRIBUTE
January 1987 saw the loss of Andreii Tarkovskii,
probably the most talented of contemporary Soviet
film directors. He died of lung cancer in Paris at the
age of 54. His first film, the "diploma film" at the
Moscow Film Institute in 1959, was entitled The
Roller and the Violin (MOSFILM, 1960), which
strongly influenced by Albert Lamorice's Red
Balloon. It was about the friendship between a little
boy, a violinist and a worker laying asphalt.
Two years later his reputation was made with
the full-length feature film Ivan's Childhood
(MOSFIT..M 1962), which won the Golden Lion at the
Venice Film Festival. It concerned itself with a
young boy growing up in a combat area during World
War ll.
Certainly his best known film was the portrayal
of the life and times of Russia's greatest
iconographer, Andrei Rublev (MOSFIT..M 1968), which
he deliberately filmed in black and white, his favorite
medium. Nevertheless, in all versions available for
public showing both in the USSR and abroad, sections
of the film have been edited out. These are primarily
concerned with an artistic statement - the fact that
an artist must remain true to his art no matter what
the political or economic conditions of the moment
appear to dictate.
9
His next film, Solaris (MOSFIL M 197 2), was an
adaptation of a novel by Polish science fiction writer
Stanislaw Lem. The action takes place on a space
station and concerns itself with a whole range of
moral problems. The major question relates to
progress and humanity and the scholar's duty to both
science and his own conscience.
The Mirror (MOSFll..M 1974), his next film, was
primarily auto-biographical, a type of "confession."
Tarkovskii was the sone of the poet Arsenii
Tarkovskii whose family, for many generations, had
been residents of Moscow. The future film director
uses this film to make a poetic statement, a poem
about childhood. In this film the technique of tinting
parts of a black and white film was used by him to
great advantage for the first time.
Possibly his finest film was Stalker which was
reviewed in a previous issue of SEEDTF. His first
film after his decision to remain in the west, filmed
in Italy, was N ostalghia, also previously reviewed in
SEEDTF.
His last film, made in Sweden, was The
Sacrifice which he was nominated for an Academy
Award for best foreign film in 1986. Alas, it did not
win. The film quite consciously was the director's
last work in which he questioned his own existence
and his readiness to die. It will be reviewed in a
future issue of SEEDTF.
It is sad that a director of such genius was able
to produce only seven films in a 26-year career, and
only four full-length feature films in his own
homeland. He was simply too dangerous to be
permitted to create according to his own conscience
and artistic objectives and was therefore highly
restricted by the Soviet censors. His films were
rarely shown, and primarily to private audiences.
The intelligentsia prizes him very highly and flocks to
showings of his films (the Moscow State University
movie theatre is an excellent example), whenever the
possibility is offered.
10
Fortunately, his name was not erased from the
public media after he decided not to return to the
USSR from Italy. Mentions of his films, both positive
and negative, were still published in the official film
journals. Right now, in the spirit of "glasnost," his
name has appeared more frequently. Particularly
now that he is dead and can no longer defend or
explain his artistic and philosophical views, it is quite
likely that he will soon be completely rehabilitated.
Most recently, Elem Klimov, the chairman of the
Soviet Film Makers Union, announced that Soviet
authorities will negotiate to buy the rights to
Tarkovskii's last two films from the west.
Leo Hecht, George Mason University
Nikita Mikhalkov's Revisionist Oblomov
Nikita Mikhalkov's 1980 adapation of Ivan
Goncharov's novel Oblomov (1859) was meant to offer
a corrective to the negative view of the eponymous
hero which had been widespread in Soviet cui tural
life, and which stretches all the way back to Nikolai
Dobrolyubov's essay, "Chto takoe Oblomovshchina?"
(What is Oblomovism?) (1859). Since then
Oblomovism has been considered a Russian problem.
In interviews, Mikhalkov has indicated that the
Oblomov problem in Russia is only a problem for
those who believe in bowtd.less progress and activity
at any price. Following his lead, an English-language
survey of Mikhalkov's film career by Karen J aehne is
entitled "Rehabilitating the Superfluous Man." per
article stresses that Oblomov is not just a failure.
AI though this assessment is an accurate one, we
must remember that the term "superfluous man" was
not originally used to describe Oblomovism.
Turgenev published his story, "The Diary of a
Superfluous Man," in 1850, the year after the
appearance of "Oblomov's Dream," which was written
about ten years before most of the rest of the
novel. In Turgenev's story, the first-person narrator,
11
on his death bed, gtves himself the designation
"Superfluous Man." He has been nnable to win the
love of the yonng woman he has idolized, and after an
embarrassing duel with the man she really loves, he
feels that his life is a complete waste
In his essay,
2
Dobrolyubov (1836-1861), a
radical critic, took the w<;>rd "Oblomovshchina," used
by Stolz on the last page of the novel, and tried to
understand its essence. He saw Oblomov as the
culmination of a type of protagonist in Russian
literature represented by Pushkin's Eugene Onegin,
Lermontov's Pechorin, and Turgenev's Rudin (from
the eponymous novel of 1856). As there is some
resemblance between the Superfluous Man and Rudin,
the Superfluous Man can be indirectly connected with
Oblomovism. However, it is better to keep the two
terms clear in one's mind.
The essay by Dobrolyubov is brilliant, but
careless in its generalizations. It asserts connections
between several ineffectual and apathetic literary
heroes, and it indicates traits they hold in common.
Nevertheless, Oblomov does not hold people in
contempt, seek self-humiliation, and treat women
callously, as Dobrolyubov believes.
Yet in fairness to this critic, he clearly points
out that he is discussing Oblomovism as a variety of
social illness rather than dissecting the character of
Ilya Ilyich Oblomov. In other words, his Oblomov is
already a composite, an amalgam not only of the
literary protagonists of the past but of the
ineffectual Russians he is most anxious to condemn.
Clearly, Mikhalkov had a right to protect Oblomov
from the nnfair censures levied against him by
Dobrolyubov, but a close reading of the novel will
show that he has really gone a bit far in his
rehabilitation of this extremely complex character.
Sauro Borelli quotes Mikhalkov on how he went
about adapting Goncharov's novel:
12
I thought for a long time that if I were to
succeed in directing Oblomov, I would have to
do it in an extremely literary way... That
doesn't mean that it has to be adapted word by
word. In general, I think it is necessary to
retain from the literary original the spirit which
dominates it-the unique and unrepeatable
world of a great writer. It seemed to me
unthinkable to make a slow film about the slow
Oblomov and about the strong, intelligent, and
active Stolz in a literal way, the way in which
. probably everyone reads Goncharov's novel. For
me Oblomov is the clear expression of a certain
national character, and for me the most
important thing is to understand his force and
his weakness, to show how he becomes the lover
of a woman of the type she is. What? How? A
man so little handsome, and so lazy!
3
(translation mine)
The decision to abandon the pacing of the novel,
which varies in each of its four distinctive parts, can
be seen indirectly in the film's title, Neskol'ko Dnei
iz Zhizni I. I. Oblomova. The title, "A Few Days in
the Life of I. I. Oblomov," indicates that Mikhalkov,
in addition to his stated interest in the protagonist's
character, is also concerned with the narrative
technique of the film. This technique tends to put
Oblomov in a positive light, and Mikhalkov aligns
himself with critics who have been sympathetic to
the figure (F. D. Reeve and R. Poggioli) against the
Dobrolyubov-inspired faction (Gorki, D. S. Mirski, and
M. Slonim).
4
Because of the century-old de bate on
the character of Oblomov, Mikhalkov's film version is
not simply the adaptation. of a famous novel, but an
important indicator of how contemporary artists in
the Soviet Union interpret a figure of great
importance to Russian identity.
There are main features of the film's narrative
technique which buttress the sympathetic view of
Oblomov: (1) the authoritative voice-over, (Z) the
13
daily and seasonal cycle which conflicts with
"neskol'ko dnei," (3) the slowing down rather than the
acceleration of time in Part. Two of the film, (4)
flashbacks to the youth of Oblomov and Stolz, and (5)
the interpolation of a crucial, thematic debate
between Oblomov and Stolz in a bathhouse, a scene
with no basis in the novel. We shall look at these
point by point and then evaluate the degree to which
Mikhalkov's version of Oblomov is truly revisionist.
1. The voice-over narration occurs at fifteen
points in the film. Sometimes the quotations are
taken directly from the novel. At other times they
are the words of Mikhalkov and his co-scenarist
Alexander Adabashyan. Because we are treated to
book illustrations which turn into real sets towards
the beginning of the film, we tend to look on the
voice-over as illustrative of the novel also. However,
this fidelity to the original novel is not preserved.
Because the film takes off in its own direction, we
must conclude that the title phrase, "a few days from
the life," refers not to the life of Oblomov as it
exists in the text. In other words, we are not being
given a selection of incidents or an abbreviation of
the novel. Instead, the "few days" are taken from the
essence of Oblomov's life, an essence each individual
reader inevitably constructs out of the given text. In
the film we see various incidents which could very
conceivably have happened, but which can only be
lacunae in the text: the midnight meal of Oblomov
and Stolz, their dialogue in the bathhouse (both from
Part I of the film), Oblomov's destruction of the tree
which blocks Olga's view, the storm he sits through in
the pavilion, and the ride on the odd-looking bicycle
(from Part ll)o In all cases the omniscient voice-over
is the voice of authority and it does not undercut the
actions of the hero.
In the novel the authority of the omniscient
narration is suddenly cailed into question at the close
of the action. Stolz and an author friend of his
encounter the beggar Zakhar:
14
'Well, you've heard the story of
this beggar, haven't you?' Stolz said to
his friend.
'Who is this Ilya Ilyich he
mentioned?' asked the writer.
'Oblomov: I've often spoken to you
about him.'
'Yes, I remember the name, He
was your friend and school-fellow. What
became of him?'
'He's dead. He wasted his life!'
Stolz sighed and fell into thought.
'And he was as intelligent as
anybody, his soul was pure and clear as
crystal-noble, affectionate, and--he
perished!'
'But why? What was the reason?'
'The reason-what a reason!
Oblomovitis!' said Stolz.
'Oblomovitis?' the writer repea,ted
in bewilderment. 'What's that?'
'I'll ten you in a moment: let me
collect my thoughts and memories. And
you write it down: someone may find it
useful.'
And he told hitg what is written
here. (tr. Magarshack)
The closing sentence of the novel, "I am
rasskazal emu, chto zdes' napisano, u
6
indicates that
Stolz's version of the events is embedded in the
narrati on itself. Either Stolz told the "author" the
events of the story, or else they coincide perfectly
with the narration itself. With this sudden
revelation, we can no longer look on the narrative as
the story of Oblomov's life. Instead we must see it as
the narration of Oblomov's failure to live up to his
15
potential, and from it we must learn the dangers of
Oblomovism (or, Oblomovitis). In contrast, the
voice-over of the film has no mission to explain
anything, only recount. We learn of Oblomov's death
from the voice-over, but it does not have to be
accounted for. It is a natural death, not death by
Oblomovism. Thus the strictures on Oblomov's life
suggested by the text are pushed aside.
z. The "few days" approach of the title
suggests a traditional "tranche de vie" of realism.
Nevertheless, the film's circular pattern takes it in
the opposite direction. The l.ast scene switches the
focus to Andrei (named after Stolz), Oblomov's son
with Agafya Matveyevna. We see the boy, who looks
so much like his father, awaiting the visit of his
mother on the estate of the Stolzes, who play the
role of his guardians. The film's narrative is circular,
for the opening scene, derived from the material in
the chapter "Oblomov's Dream," showed Oblomov at
a similar age, waiting expectantly to see his mother
again once she awakened from sleep.
The film, divided into two equal parts (filmed in
reverse order by Mikhalkov, who made another
feature film between times), has an obvious
summer/winter dichotomy, which is bridged by the
desire of a boy to see his mother. Since the novel
clearly opens on May 1, we know that Mikhalkov has
changed the season to establish more of a connection
between the summer idyll with Olga and Oblomov's
childhood. The three flashbacks, taken from
"Oblomov's Dream" and inserted in Part One of the
film, all show a peaceful summer scene. The
significant conclusion of the dream, in which little
Ilya is hit by a snowball and kept inside the house by
his parents, is omitted. The past, reduced to a long
summer, is a paradise which can perhaps be regained
by Oblomov's wooing of Olga. The desire for the lost
paradise is already in the novel, as Mil ton Ehre has
shown in detail, but in the film it is even more
visible. As a result, Oblomov's desire for paradise in
16
the film is much more prominent than his desire to
escape from the responsibilities he has been given.
3. In Goncharov's novel, the weight of time is
oppressively felt in the way the story is divided into
sections. Book One covers one day; Two, the events
of a summer; Three, fall and winter; and Four, about
fourteen years. As time moves on in larger and
larger increments, the weight of hum an contingency
becomes more and more of a burden. Time leaves
procrastinators such as Oblomov without sufficient
means to arrive at individualization. Despite his
goodness, Oblomov is clearly inadequate over the
course of years.
Mikhalkov drastically changes the time frame
so that it is in Part Two that we can see how slowly
time goes by. Part One of the film can not be
located so clearly in time. After the appearance of
Stolz in Oblomov's apartment, we have a sequence of
visits made by the two friends which may occur over
the course of a week or a month. The midnight
snack, the dialogue in the bathhouse and the first
appearance of Olga are not temporally positioned any
more clearly, and the outdoor winter scenes at tpe
end of Part One could take place over several days.
In Part Two it is apparent that the summer idyll
encompasses five days. All the clues are given to the
viewer. On the first day, the Baron and Olga's aunt
are present while Oblomov is with Olga. Later that
day, she declares her love, and that night Oblomov
writes his letter to her, saying that she does not
really love him. The next (second) afternoon, they
quarrel, and Oblomov spends the night outside in the
pavilion during the storm. The third day, he goes to
the party where Olga's friends are gathered. On the
evening of the next (fourth) day, he discusses the
state of the world with Alexeyev as they watch the
fireworks. On the fifth day, Stolz returns from
Switzerland. He, Olga, and Oblomov ride in the
horse-drawn carriage and then on the bicycle before
the narrator interrupts to tell us that Oblomov moved
17
back to town the next day. The intercutting of two
more reveries from "Oblomov's Dream" once again
reinforces the idea that Oblomov's loss of Olga is
another version of the loss of his youth, which is
inevitable for ever_yone. The faults which are part
and parcel of Oblomovism are glossed over.
4 The inclusion of flashbacks in the film (five
about Oblomov and one about Stolz) suggests an
Oblomov who is determined by his past. In the novel,
Oblomov has only one major dream, so the film
makes the material from the past seem more
obsessive. In the novel, the 33-year-old Oblomov is
juxtaposed with himself as both a 7- and a 13-year-
old, not just a 7-year-old, as in the film. The novel,
by showing Oblomov as a teenager, makes it more
obvious why he should fail at running his estate. We
have already seen him have trouble concentrating at
schooL
In the film the flashbacks are so arranged that,
laid side to side, they look like they form a day-a
day which has an archetypal value which the adult
Oblomov's "neskol'ko dnei" do not recapitulate. The
first three flashbacks taken from "Oblomov's Dream"
describe Oblomov at age seven, and the latter two at
age thirteen, but in the film they all pertain to the
younger Oblomov once they have been rearranged.
First, the nanny gives Ilya a bath while the boy
anxiously waits for his mother to get up. It is still
dark outside, and the nanny tells him that the sun is
going to meet the moon. In the second flashback, the
mother is fast asleep, but the father kisses Ilya and
talks to some peasants. In Flashback 3, it is midday,
and all the servants . are taking a nap in their
quarters. Ilya and Andrei play on the swings together
(an incident which is not in the novel). After the
flashback to Andrei's departure for school, we have a
scene from the late afternoon. The mother is getting
ready to put Ilya to bed while the father is discussing
a toboganning .incident with the serfs. In the
bedroom, Ilya asks his mother not to go away
(another addition of the film). The final flashback
18
shows Ilya and his mother standing in the doorway.
Ilya has awakened early, and they are going to say
prayers before morning. The request, "0 Lord make
me merciful!" is one which Ilya tries to put into
effect in his life. Mother and child are photographed
in lighting which reminds the viewer of Madonna and
Child paintings of the Renaissance.
The day which goes by in the flashbacks is one
which takes place in a habitual, undisturbed past
time. Unpleasant incidents from the childhood years
are omitted. Absent, for example, is the incident of
the stranger who lies in a ditch and who is not taken
in by the rural community. The novel makes obvious
-both the inhospitality of the people and the
overprotectiveness of Oblomov's parents. The film
goes too far to accommodate Russian pastoral and
populism.
The film's flashbacks turn Oblomov into a
daydreamer as well as a dreamer. In Part Two of the
film, his fourth and fifth flashbacks are induced by
reveries. Before the fourth flashback, he lies down
indolently in the summer grass, and for the first time
we see both mother and child united. The fifth
flashback comes during the evening thunderstorm
after the quarrel with Olga and abortive reconcili-
ation. After this point there is no further occasion to
daydream. With the loss of Olga goes the hope for
the blissful past recaptured.
The motif of the pastoral, paradisical world is
used three times by Oblomov in the film where it is
not present in the novel. First, in the bathhouse,
Oblomov tells Stolz that he watches a tree and knows
that the branches carry with them from year to year
some memory of the leaves which bloomed and died
the year before. In Part Two, on the first day, he
confesses to Olga that he is part of some great whole
like a leaf on a branch. The next day, Olga reads in
her letter from him that she is a bird who has lighted
by accident on the wrong branch and that she should
move along. In the novel, the withering lilac is the
19
symbol of the loss of love. In the film, Oblomov's
self-identificati on with deciduous trees links him to
the summer, while also suggesti ng that he has no
other cycle of action for himself outside of the
rhythms of nature.
5 In the set piece of the film, the bathhouse
scene, where the tree image is introduced, Oblomov
gains the upper hand in his philosophical exchange
with Stolz (lightly suggested by a few lines in Book Z,
Chapter 4 of the novel). Mikhalkov has so slanted the
conversation against Stolz that his position is
basically untenable. Stolz sides with business and the
practical upward mobility provided by a university
education. We have just seen him take Oblomov on a
string of toadying visits to influential people in the
bureaucracy. ?tolz has also brought him in tow on
some vapid social get-togethers. The Stolz of the
movie connects progress with the idea of gaining
more money and more land. In the novel, there is
greater depth to Stolz. He reminds Oblomov that he
has put away his books and translations. Here it is
not simply a question of making his estate into a
money-producing venture now that the bailiff has
cheated Oblomov Stolz wants Oblomov to remember
the noble ideals of Rousseau, Schiller, Goethe, and
Byron. In the film, Oblomov is only a disappointed
romantic. In the novel, he is also a person who has
failed to live up to the ideals of the Romantic
movement itself. His characterization is so rich that
we can not see him simply as typed by his class.
8
The bathhouse scene does not incorporate the
self-criticism that Oblomov can level at himself on
occasion. Oblomovism in the novel does not just
include the hero's remaining a child, but his falling
from a higher state as well. Oblomov states:
My life began by flickering out. It may
sound strange, but it is so. From the
very first moment I became conscious of
myself, I felt that I was already
flickering out. (383)
zo
In the bathhouse, Stolz is a type of tempt9r, which is
a valid idea, considering Goncharov's interest in the
Faust-M ethistophel es legend. Yet in the novel,
Oblomov has already been tempted by a life of ease,
and no specific tempter is involved.
Mikhalkov makes the mistake of associating
time with material progress in the film, and he fails
to suggest the course in life over which a man can
maximize his talents. In the film, Stolz's simple
philosophy of living life to the fullest each day is not
objectionable per se, but in practice it amounts to a
work ethic at best and a creed of social advancement
at worst. Oblomov, whose lethargy is the flip side of
his goodness, can see the error of his friend's ways,
but he never summons himself to the exercise of his
brain, the pursuit of art, or dedication to social
service. The film never makes clear what Oblomov's
(and Everyman's) alternatives really are.
It would be of particular interest to see how
Mikhalkov's film was received by the official Soviet
press and to examine audiences' reactions to it. The
director certainly deserves credit for indicating that
the materialism inherent in progress for the sake of
progress can destroy Russia. At the same time, he
expresses a rather nostalgic look at Russian rural
life, which has been presented in very negative terms
by Klimov in Rasputin, for example. Industrialism
has indeed been a great menace to Russian life, but it
is best not to overglamorize country life.
On the other hand, N eskol'ko Dnei may not
strike some people as being particularly critical of
contemporary life in the Soviet Union. It is obvious
that Soviet military outlays and bureaucracy have
prevented her citizens from keeping up with the
Western countries i n goods, services, and housing. In
Mikhalkov's film, "progress" comes from the West. It
is brought back by the tempter Stolz. It is possible to
read into the film a certain acceptance of the status
quo in which the living standard is patently below
2.1
what it should be in a country full of such great
natural resources.
The critique and acceptance of Soviet life
which can be extrapolated from N eskol'ko Dnei gives
credence to those critics who decry the division of
Soviet art into dissident and non-dissident. This
double face can often be seen in films which are set
in either the past or the future. Tarkovski's Andrei
Rublev and Stalker come readily to mind. None of
Tarkovski's films, however, has had to treat the
relationship of the Russian nineteenth century (and
all its great achievements in the arts) to the
present. Karen Jaehne has given some expression to
this issue by interpreting the function of the
"superfluous man" in today's world. She writes:
From one point of view, the superfluous
man can be seen as taking a position of
passive resistance to a society he
disapproves of; from another viewpoint,
his existence is parasitic,
counterproductive, and deserving of
wholesale condemnation. It is to
Mikhalkov's credit that he has managed
to make his superfluous hero
sympathetic, attractive, and thus, in his
~ i s t l s s . and
9
somnolent condition,
mtereshng
Such a formulation overemphasizes the relationship
of the individual to society and fails to deal with the
individual's duty to himself. It also asks for a higher
degree of formulation of the idea of "passive
resistance." Mikhalkov's Oblomov is admirable to the
degree that his passiveness is chosen, and the one
scene in which we feel that it truly comes from
volition is in the bathhouse. In Part ll of the film,
Mikhalkov does a good job of making it ambiguous as
to whether Oblomov's flight from Olga's love is
wisdom, timidity, or perhaps both, and here he
captures the complexity of Goncharov's characteri-
zz
zation, which he so unfortunately misses elsewhere
Mikhalkov, however, despite his simplifications,
does know his Goncharov. He feels a responsibility to
include Goncharov's Russian Orthodox faith in his
adaptation. In the final scene, as little Andrei Ilyich
waits the arrival of his mother, we hear non-diagetic
church music by Rachmaninoff. Until this point,
except for the scene with the morning prayers, the
film has been secular, and the novel itself is not
explicitly religious. Nevertheless, it is well
documented that Goncharov was a devout Christian
As Yvette Louria and Morton I. Seiden point out:
In his essay "Christ in the Desert"
G oncharov argues that it is only under
the influence of "such a strong stimulus
as Christian faith that the phantasy of
the artist could produce the Sistine
Madonna and other marvels of art-of
course with the gift of genius-and even
a great talent, without such a powerful
stimulus as faith, having drawn well
certain details of the picture" would not
have painted them "as true to life a.s
they appear in the Gospels to a pious
spectator." And he solemnly adds,
"Almost all geniuses in art belong to
Christianity"; for "the contemporary
realists can do nothing but follow
historical truth and illuminate it only
with their artistic phantasy. They go it
without the admixture of faith
1
Perhaps Mikhalkov knew of this passage, for the
Renaissance Madonna and Child were recalled in
Oblomov's final flashback.
Cognizance of Goncharov's religious convictions
does not force us to conclude that Oblomov is a
religious hero as Louria and Seiden make him out to
be. They do not feel that he is slothful. Instead, he
radiates love, and either does not see man's evil
23
nature, or else forgives it. They are at the opposite
end of the critical spectrum from Dobrolyubov's
indictment of Goncharov as a parasite and failure.
Surely, Gyycharov's Oblomov has both his good and
bad sides.
Turning from the novel back to the film,
Mikhalkov does not include important scenes which
Louria and Seiden use to support their case. Absent
are Olga's sense of spiritual awakening brought on by
Oblomov, Zakhar's devotion to his master after
death, and Oblomov's summoning Agafya Matveyevna
from her years of torpor. It is conceivable that if
Mikhalkov had wanted to make. N eskol'ko Dnei more
religious in its orientation, he would have had
censorship problems. Even revisionism has its limits.
Notes
1Karen J aehne, "Rehabilitating the Superfluous
Man: The Films in the Life of Nikita Mikhalkov,"
Film Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 1 (1981), 14-21. In
addition, Donna T. Seifer, at work on a long, thorough
study of Mikhalkov, presented a paper on his film
Without Witnesses at the 1985 Chicago meeting of
AATSEEL (American Association of Teachers of
Slavic and East European Languages).
2
Nikolai Alesandrovich Dobrolyubov, Selected
Philosophical Essays (Moscow: Foreign Languages
Publication House, 1956), pp. 174-217.
3
sauro Borelli, Nikita Mikhalkov (Florence: La
Nuova Italia, 1982).
4
For a summary of criticism of the novel, see
Yvette Louria and Morton I. Seiden, "Ivan
Goncharov's Oblomov: The Anti-Faust as Christian
Hero," Canadian Slavic Studies, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Spring
1969), pp. 39-68. See p. 41.
5
Ivan Goncharov, Oblomov, trans. David
Magarshack (London: Penguin, 1983). The
translation first appeared in 1954. All page
references are to this edition.
24
61van Goncharov, Oblomov (Leningrad:
Izdatel'stvo Detskaya Literatura, 1967), p. 550.
7
Mil ton Ehre, Oblomov and His Creator: The
Life and Art of Ivan Goncharov (Princeton, NJ:
Princeton Univ. Press, 1973), pp. 154-232.
8
vsevolod Setchkarev, Ivan Goncharov: His
Life and His Work (Wurzburg: Jal-Verlag, 1974), p.
140.
9
J aehne, p. 20.
10
Louria and Seiden, p. 43.
11
See Alexandra Lyngstad and Sverre Lyngstad,
Ivan Goncharov (New York: Twayne, 1971), pp. 115-
48, for a good existential analysis of Oblomov's
failings.
. Peter G. Christensen, SUNY - Binghamton
New Direction at the Ermolova Theatre
In Moscow this summer (June 1986), I saw the
first two productions staged at the Ermolova Theatre
by its new chief director Valerii Fokin, who recently
moved there after almost fifteen years as a director
at the Sovremennik Theatre. These were Aleksandr
Buravskii's Speak (Govori) and Vladlen Dozortsev's
The Last Visitor (Poslednii posetitel'). Buravskii's
play Speak was staged by Fokin as tribute to the 27th
Congress of the Communist Party ar.d opened a few
weeks before that event. In its premiere at the
Gorky Theatre (BDT) in Leningrad, Dozortsev's play
served a similar function. Both these productions
were inspired by Gorbachev's recent call for glasnost'
(openness) in Soviet society. Speak is entirely
ideological, while The Last Visitor is somewhat more
universal. That they are also very successful as
theatre is high prase for the directorial talents of
Fokin, now recognized as one of the most creative
professional directors in the Soviet Union today.
25
For his play Speak Buravskii has taken themes
and events from the life and work of prose writer and
playwright Valentin Ovechkin (1904-1968). The
choice of Ovechkin is a significant one, since he is
remembered for the seminal role he played in the
development of Soviet literature in the 19 50s,
beginning on the eve of Stalin's death. Even in the
1930s Ovechkin was a critical realist, not a socialist
realist. His best-known and most influential work is
a series of five sketches (ocherki) entitled District
Weekdays (Raionnye budni) (1952-56), which Deming
Brown has termed "the first important work of
critical realism in postwar village literature." Many
of the events of Speak come from the first of those
sketches, from which the series takes its title. In
them, Ovechkin, an active Party member, openly
criticised problems in agriculture, directly
attributing them to government and Party
shortcomings. He daringly broached issues of
conflict between individual and state/Party
interests. During the all too brief cultural "thaw"
immediately following Stalin's death, Ovechkin's
views were even officially sanctioned. Yet after the
ouster of Khrushchev, bureaucratic intransigence
again became the norm, leaving the writer's call for
change largely unfulfilled.
Speak takes place in a rural setting (the Troitsk
district) during the historically crucial years of 1952
to 1954. Described as "eternal", "middle Russia",
Troitsk acquires a clearly symbolic dimension. The
play contrasts the period in Soviet history
immediately before and after Stalin's death in March
1953, focusing on the relationship between
Communist Party bureaucrats and the people. The
plot concerns a confrontation between the first
secretary of the district Party committee, Borzov, a
Stalinist-style careerist, who does whatever his
superiors demand, and the new second secretary,
Martynov, a reasonable and realistic man, a Party
bureaucrat with a human face, who respects and tries
to understand the collective farmers. After Stalin's
26
death in the middle of the play, Borzov is replaced by
Martynov, who, despite his initial idealism, begins to
display typically authoritarian, Borzov-like behavior
toward the end of the play.
Ultimately Martynov is able to break out of his
bureaucratic mold with support from two external
forces, the writer and the peasant chorus. Although
the writer is meant to be 0 vechkin (he is ref erred to
by Ovechkin's name and patronymic, Valentin
Vladimirovich, and given specific attributes from his
career), the role acquires greater significance than
the mere biographical portrayal of a particular
writer. In the script and in the list of cast in the
program, he is identified simply as Writer. This
tendency toward abstraction reinforces his symbolic
function as the traditional conscience and spokesman
of Russian society, which has suffered from varying
degrees of repression and censorship for centuries. In
his first encounter with Martynov, the writer makes
it clear he wants
11
to tell everything that is
necessary.
11
He has come to observe the agricultural
scene and is prepared to tell it as it is.
The writer's voice is further strengthened
through the device of a play within a play, giving him
a forum to express ideas otherwise difficult to put
forward. The local theatre produces one of his highly
critical plays. In an early scene, two provincial
actresses are outraged by the writer's direct
expression of honest criticism in his play and demand
he change the lines. True to character, he refuses.
In a scene after Stalin's death, the two actresses who
earlier had challenged the writer's direct approach to
problems are now able to accept his critical stance.
They are especially pleased with the play's success,
for it may give them the chance to go on tour to
Moscow!
An even more powerful device in the play is the
chorus, composed of diverse faces from different
generations, all from the people (narod). It appears
five times in the course of the production and serves
Z7
to articulate the growing dissatisfaction of the
previously silent peasant population. It is always
accompanied by the presence of both Martynov and
the writer, who symbolize the dominance of the
Party and the intelligentsia. Through the voice of
the chorus, M artynov's early comment to the writer;
"Speak what you think" ("Govori, chto dumaesh'"),
becomes the play's powerful refrain: "Speak!" In its
initial appearance in Scene 1, the voices of the
chorus are quiet and tired, coming from the darkened
stage rear, a kind of deus ex machina. In each
appearance the increasingly important role of the
chorus is enhanced through special lighting effects,
which make the actors ever more visible as they
speak. Gradually through the play the strength of the
chorus grows crescendo-like, until it finally comes to
dominate. What begins in the first scene as a gentle
rivulet, the timid expression of some discontent,
becomes a torrential river, a threatening flood of
irrepressible voices at the end of the final scene.
The theme introduced by the writer at the beginning
and first delivered pianissimo by the chorus, through
gradual repetition, becomes a deafening forte From
stage rear the chorus moves determinedly to stage
front, chanting in ever louder voices the refrain,
"Speak!", with the last refrain pronounced
unexpectedly by a child, producing an overwhelming
effect on the audience. The child's voice reminds us
of the crucial stake the younger generation has in the
reform of Soviet society.
Fokin's production of Speak creatively
interprets Buravskii's script, adding significant visual
images that enhance the ideas of the play. By
beginning with the curtain open and leaving it that
way throughout, Fok.in helps diminish the otherwise
inevitable distance between the audience and the
actors on a traditional proscenium stage. The play's
two acts consist of a carefully balanced montage of
scenes, four on the collective farm fields and in the
village, four in district Party headquarters, one in
each act at the theatre (the play within the play), one
2.8
in a town park, and another in an apartment. While
most of these scenes are played on the central stage,
three of the shorter ones (the play within the play
and the apartment), are set on the left or right sides,
bringing the audience into palpably close contact
with the actors.
Fokin underscores the often ironic juxtaposition
of scenes (realism versus socialist realism) by several
important visual devices. His production begins with
a rousing Stalinist newsreel (not indicated in the
script) depicting a glorious grain harvest in typical
socialist realist style. This is followed in stark
contrast by the first scene, which is set against a
torrential rain, anything but ideal weather for
harvesting grain. Reality has nothing in common
with the way in which it is portrayed. Another ironic
visual juxtaposition found only in the production and
not in the play is the use of a statue of Stalin. On
the set representing district Party headquarters,
Stalin's bust is prominently displayed in the first half
of the play and conspicuously absent in the second,
subtly reinforcing the implications of Stalin's death.
De-Stalinization is never overtly mentioned. Only its
results are indicated.
Although it can be interpreted as the pivotal
point of the play, Stalin's death is conveyed in a
minimalist manner During a scene near the end of
the first act set in provincial Troitsk's Park of
Cui ture, the typically cheerful and uplifting music
blaring over the loudspeaker is interrupted by a
solemn documentary radio announcement of Stalin's
last illness and death, followed briefly_ by wailing
women's voices. A momentous historical event is
here reduced to a common theatrical one-an
offstage death. Diminished by virtue of its
indirectness, that very diminishment of Stalin's death
works as an aesthetic device. Life on stage
continues, in some ways changed, but in other
important ways the same as before
29
In the scene following the news of Stalin's death
(the final one of Act 1), the audience is not SW'prised
to find Martynov some two months later already
serving as first Party secretary in place of the
recently deposed Borzov. Equally predictable are the
attitudes of the people toward the new leadership and
the collective farm. During his first reception for his
Party subordinates, Martynov receives only congrat-
ulations on his new post, not the discussion of
problems he had anticipated. In the next scene he
discovers similar behavior on the part of the
peasants. They work not to produce the best possible
harvest but merely to get their job done with minimal
effort, because "worse is better." And so the
problems are revealed, the disparity between the
Party bureaucrats and the people further exposed.
The ultimate irony comes in the next-to-last scene,
when the behavior of Martynov and the new second
secretary, Rudenko, has become almost indis-
tinguishable from that of their earlier opponent
Borzov. In his preparations for the upcoming district
Party conference, Martynov dogmatically declares
that meetings are to be held only with official
permission. Bureaucratic habits die hard.
The monumental inertia of the system is
brilliantly conveyed in the last scene depicting the
district Party conference in the Troitsk House of
Culture. As it opens, the meeting is already in
progress, with the entire local presidium minus
M artynov on the podium. In a remarkable dram a tic
tour de force Rudenko is reading his talk in a droning
monotone to a large but obviously bored audience.
He ends with the usual dull panegyric to the people
and a quote from Maiakovskii. At the chairman's
request for questions there is only indifferent silence
and coughing. Also in a manner familiar to the
Soviet theatre audience, the next speaker, a
collective farm milkmaid, stumbles through a text
obviously prepared by someone else. When
interrupted by Martynov, who has appeared at the
door, she admits it had been written for last year's
30
meeting and simply updated for this one At this
point questions arise. Where did Martynov come
from and why was he missing from the podium?
Since he enters from the side, the audience sees him
not as a participant in the scene, someone clearly co-
opted by the corrupt system, but rather as a witness
to that depressing scene. Presumably having
experienced a moment of crisis, he is able once more
to challenge the status quo and demand that things
change. He reintroduces the crucial element of
critical realism into an otherwise socialist realist
scene. Under the positive influence of the writer and
chorus, he has proven himself a dramatic character
who undergoes change, rather than a purely static
one. Through a careful integration of what might at
first appear to be disparate elements-the writer, the
Party in the figure of Martynov, and the people's
chorus-the audience is left with a sense of unity and
hope for the future.
From the very first scene the writer
foreshadows the changes to com.e after Stalin's death
through his insistance with Martynov on the need to
write honestly. His position is historically confirmed,
when he announces that he has received an
acceptance telegram for his latest manuscript from
Tvardovskii, whom the Soviet audience recognizes as
the liberal editor-in-chief of the major Soviet
literary monthly N ovyi mir. After Stalin's death, an
explicit reference to the cultural "thaw" is made in
the scene set in the Martynovs' apartment. A visitor
from the city, now a graduate student at Moscow
University, recites the bold poetry of the young poet
Evtushenko. The lines of "Prologue", expressing a
yearning to travel abroad, sound as daring in 1986 as
they must have in 1954. (The poem actually dates
from 1955 ) These instances of literary citation
convey moments when writers gave voice to
something daring. They are reminders of the need to
express fresh themes, as well as the need to find new
forms for their expression
31
Those needs are well met in Fokin's striking
production of Buravskii's outspoken play. Through a
well-balanced blend of realistic and hyperbolic
means, it gives expression to the long-held desire for
change now officially sanctioned by Gorbachev's
current policy of glasnost'. At this time of political
and cultural renewal, so reminiscent of the "thaw"
immediately following Stalin's death, Speak boldly
calls for a reversal of traditional roles. It is not the
Party who should lead the people, but the people-
that power chorus-who must lead the Party.
For his second production at the Ermolova
Theatre Fokin chose a play similar to Speak in theme
(the shortcomings of Soviet society) but very
different in approach. Dozortsev's The Last Visitor is
a tightly constructed psychological suspense drama, a
discussion play, with a very small cast (three male
leads and two smaller female roles) all staged on one
set. The two acts are made to feel continuous by
having the beginning of Act ll repeat a few lines from
the end of Act I. Although it takes place in
contemporary Moscow, the issues it raises are by no
means limited to the Soviet system, but can be seen
also as universal ones, associated with the power
elite in any complex, modern society.
Once again the curtain is open throughout the
performance. The set is minimal, representing a very
modern office housed in an old, historic building. A
television with the volume turned down is on for the
duration of the play. A digital clock gives the actual
time. In the opening scene an official is conducting
an interview with a German delegation, aided by an
interpreter. Meanwhile a male secretary is busily
typing. It quickly becomes apparent that this is the
office of the deputy minister of health, Kazmin, who
is expecting to be promoted to the rank of minister in
the very near future.
pon completion of the interview, the
secretary, Ermakov, ushers in the next scheduled
visitors-a man around forty and a woman in her late
32
twenties. From this point, on much in the exposition
is reminiscent of modern Western drama, of Pinter,
Beckett, and the theatre of the absurd. There are
moments when one is even reminded of Sartre's No
Exit. arallels can also be drawn with such-a
currently popular Soviet playwright as
Petrushevskaia, whose work is created for the studio
theatre. There is little action and much dialogue
that seems to go nowhere The woman is silent and
retreats to a corner. The man, who avoids
identifying himself, at first focuses on the irrelevant
(he is bothered, for example, by the clock, which he
claims is fast), and then bluntly asks . the deputy
minister to resign his post. The audience is as
stunned as the deputy minister and his secretary.
The shock and mystery. are enhanced by the fact that
the visitor remains nameless throughout the play. In
response to an early question about who he is, he
replies: "I am no one. An ordinary person Not a
convict. Not a party member. Simply your contemp-
orary." He is everyman.
And so the plot unfolds. Some three years ago,
at his previous job as head of a special cardiac clinic,
Kazmit:t, once a highly regarded surgeon, had
apparently refused to operate on high-risk cases on
the eve of being awarded a prestigious government
prize. One of the patients he turned down, a certain
M arusin, refused to accept the diagnosis and risked
traveling to Leningrad, where Kazmin's mentor, an
older professor, successfully performed the surgery.
A young journalist, Granovich, who wrote about this
situation, was not only prevented from publishing his
article, but totally thwarted in his future career by
being accused of being drunk at the time. Eventually
it becomes clear that the visitor has come on behalf
of Granovich, now indeed an alcoholic; the woman,
Vera, accompanying him is the journalist's wife.
Their only demand is that Kazmin come clean and
admit his mistake by resigning. They have brought
with them a small archive of incriminating
evidence. The audience witnesses history repeating
33
itself. The vulnerable Kazmin is again threatened at
a decisive moment in his career, this time just as he
is about to become a minister.
While Kazmin is portrayed as somewhat vain, he
is not a totally unsympathetic character. For the
most part, he listens to the visitor's arguments and
reacts by rationalizing his behavior, claiming he is
old, tired, and not so competent as his mentor Of
course, the dubious morality of his having received
the prize (and not his mentor) escapes him. At the
very least he has been a willing accomplice to
unethical behavior. So typical of high-level
bureaucrats, his youthful idealism has given way to
the self-satisfied personal aggrandizement of middle
age. The real villain, however, is his secretary
Ermakov, who has been with him since their time
together at the special cardiac clinic. Ermakov is a
thoroughly unscrupulous character, a sleazy type who
has been in large measure responsible for his boss's
success. Not only does he write all his speeches, but
it was he who dealt directly with the journalist.
When he feels threatened by the visitor toward the
e ~ of the play, he easily disobeys the deputy
minister's orders and takes charge himself, ripping
out the telephone lines and lying about the patient
Marusin in order to get the visitor's archive. The
visitor turns over the archive to the secretary to
keep him from disturbing M arusin. Once the visitor
and Vera have left, Ermakov reveals to the deputy
minister that Marusin had died two weeks earlier
Dozortsev's play is very bold in its depiction of
serious corruption . in the upper levels of the
government bureaucracy. The vascilating and
ineffectual deputy minister, manipulated by his
ruthless, conniving secretary, is confronted by a
private individual who stands for honesty and
integrity. By vociferously challenging the concept of
the collective good over respect for the rights of the
individual (Ermakov's position), the visitor questions
the most fundamental principles upon which the
Soviet system is based. Yet at the end of the play it
34
is Ermakov who triumphs with Kazmin still at his
side. At a moment when Kazmin might have taken a
positive initiative, he reveals instead his moral
weakness.
Although the conclusion is a bleak one, leaving
the audience with no sense of optimism, it does not
exclude the possibility of positive action. While
depicting powerful evil within the system, through
the portrayal of a confrontation with good, the play
indirectly fulfills Gorbachev's current mandate. If
Speak is addressed to the people, The Last Visitor
urges the need for reform at the highest
governmental level. The exposure of such upper-
echelon bureaucratic corruption is in effect
demanding change from within.
In his first two productions at the Ermolova
Theatre, Valerii Fokin has clearly demonstrated his
acknowledged position toward the role of the
theatre In an interview this summer in Moscow he
put it directly: " serious dram a tic theatre is not
theatre that entertains or amuses, but one that above
all tries to address society's most serious and
difficult problems." Through the very different
approaches of Speak and The Last Visitor, Fokin
dramatically exhorts his audience not only to look at
the serious shortcomings of Soviet society, but also
to speak out and demand intellectual and political
honesty. One might explain Fokin's directorial
position as a response to the new call for
"openness". In fact it may be more accurate to view
it as coincidental to 'Gorbachev's policy, for Fokin's
earlier work at the Sovremennik Theatre already
revealed his interest in provocative subjects. His
very first production there in 1971, Mikhail
Roshchin's Valentin and Valentina, revealed his
innovative portrayal of the problems of contemporary
youth. His 197 8 production of Enn Vetemaa's
Monument dealt daringly with, the issues of artistic
freedom and lack thereof in Soviet society. And now
his third and most recent production at the Ermolova
Theatre (the premiere was in November 1986),
35
Edvard Radzinskii's Sporting Scenes, 1981, is proving
extremely controversial in its frank and uninhibited
portrayal of the corrupt and degenerate lives of the
Soviet elite. With Fokin as its new chief director,
the Ermolova Theatre is bound to become one of the
best and most exciting professional theatres in the
Soviet capital.
Elena Sokol, Oberlin College
The following was taken from a brochure sent by the
Polish "Authors' Agency." It is reproduced here
without commentary.
Jan Wilkowski
Tymoteusz Rymcimci
JAN Wll..KOWSKI (19Zl), an actor, director,
writer and educator centres all his activities on
puppet shows. In 1950-1970, while director of the
"Lalka" theatre in Warsaw, he wrote plays for the
theatre and many of them have become standard
classics in Polish and European puppet repertoires.
As a playwright he started with "Podroz Dziadka
Mroza" (Journey of Santa Claus - 195Z) and
"Balwankowa bajka" (Snowman's Story- 1953) which
were similar in type to children's fairy-tales. Soon,
together with Leon Moszczynski, he wrote "Guignol w
tarapatach" (Guignol in Trouble - 1956), a play for
older children on contemporary political and social
problems. It is a modem version of adventures of
Guignol -- the first puppet from Laurent Mourguet's
theatre in Lyon, a popular puppet character of the
XIX century. According to the tradition the play is
of a commedia dell'arte type with lively action, full
of songs and couplets. Apart from traditional
"Guignolian" characters C anezou, Guignol,
Madelon there are characters from the
contemporary world: Jean - the owner of a small
puppet theatre - and the Policeman. Jean and
Guignol go through the world and present puppet
36
shows. Jean acts as characters from the play, actor
on stage, audience, he relates t he events and talks
with the audience. He makes theatre within theatre
presenting story about conflicts between an ordinary
man and those who have money and power. The
action is commented upon by songs which treat about
existential uneasiness of man "Guignol in Trouble"
was created - to use the author's words - "because
there is need to tell important things to children".
Also - we may add - the play teaches them modern
theatre language.
Wilkowski's best plays were: "0 Zwyrtale
Muzykancie, czyli jak goral dostal sie do nieba"
(Zeyrtala the Musician or the Highlander in Heaven--
1957), "Kolednicy na ulicy" (Street Waits - 1962.) and
"My i nasze k.rasnoludki" (We and Our Dwarfs -
1966).
"Street Waits" is a modern version of Warsaw
Christmas performances of the XIX century arranged
in the suburban streets of the town, where the
Christmas plot is combined with contemporary
events.
"We and Our Dwarfs" resulted from the
puppeteer's experience and presents what goes on
behind the scenes.
"Zwyrtala the Musician" is based partly on
highlander stories by Kazimierz Przerwa Tetmajer
and on highland robbers poetry. It is a story about
Janosik, a folk hero, about human wrong and
revolutionary passion existing in folk legends
Zwyrtala, an old mountaineer, dies and St. Peter lets
him into Heaven. He comes during the choir
rehearsal conducted by St. Cecilia. Zwyrtala is eager
to join in music and he plays his violin louder and
louder. The angels accompany him and Zwyrtala
starts to play the highland robbers' folk dance. The
action moves from Heaven to earth to present the
story about Janosik in a "theatre within theatre"
way. The scenes show history of exploitation and
rebellion of highlanders who were led against their
37
exploiters by Janosik, Janosik's victory, love and
death of the bet-=-ayed hero. Heaven is full of
beautiful legend and songs but earthly problems
cannot interfere with divine order so Zwyrtala has to
go back to earth, with its happiness and
unhappiness. Ha leave Heaven and goes back to the
Tatra mountains which are more beautiful than
Heaven. He says: "My Heaven is where my heart is".
"Guignol in Trouble" and "Zwyrtala the
Musician" brought Han Wilkowski international
fame. In 1958 at the International Puppet Festival in
Bucharest "Guignol" got the gold medal and Grand
Prix, and "Zwyrtala the Musician" brought Wilkowski
the diploma of the "Puppeteer of the Year" from the
Critics' Club during the Theatre of Nations in Paris in
1959. World critics called "Zwyrtala" the best play
of all times.
Another trend in Wilkowski's playwriting
presents plays based on children's but with
new, unconventional contents. Here we should
01 en tion five short plays for the yotmgest children
about the adventures of Tymoteusz the teddy bear:
"Tymoteusz Rymcimci" (1960), "Tymoteusz i
lobuziaki" (Tymoteusz and Mischevious Bears -
1961), "Jesienna przygoda m151a Tymoteusza"
(Autumn Adventure of Tymoteusz 1960),
"Tymoteusz wsrod ptakow", (Tymoteusz and Birds -
1961), "Tymoteusz majsterklepka", (Tymoteusz of All
Trades - 1961). This small theatre series is
extremely popular and is often shown in children's
repertoire. The plays were performed several times
in all the republics of the Soviet Union,
Czechoslovakia, German Democratic Republic,
Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia, even Japan.
The first play in the series "Tymoteusz
Rymcimci" introduces our hero and his Father-bear
who will often appear in the next adventures.
Tymoteusz feels lonely and bored so his father
suggests they should make scrambled eggs together.
But the recipe says they need five eggs and they only
38
have four so Tymoteusz goes to Mrs. Hen's shop to
get an egg. On the way he forgets how many eggs he
should buy. He also finds nobody's Doggie. They go
to the shop together, Tymoteusz buys an egg and they
go back home with Doggie in a basket. The situation
is difficult because Father cannot stand dogs.
Tymoteusz tells his Father about a surprise in the
basket. When Father looks into the basket frightened
Doggie runs away, four eggs are broken, a chicken
appears from the fifth egg and angry Father throws
Doggie out Tymoteusz furtively lets Doggie in and
hides him under covers. At night, when everybody is
asleep, comes Fox the Thief. Doggie is alert but Fox
manages to escape. Doggie also disappears and
Tymoteusz is very worried. Suddenly Doggie comes
back and brings everything that Fox has stolen.
Tymoteusz, Father and Doggie stay together for
ever.
In "Tymoteusz and Mischievious Bears"
Tym oteusz, Father and Doggie go for a trip to the
woods where they meet other young bears.
Tymoteusz wants to make friends with them but they
scorn and frighten him when they pretend to be wild
dogs. Tymoteusz must play alone but his nice toys
attract other bears. This time Tymoteusz does not
want to speak to them. The conflict is growing and
during a big row Tymoteusz falls into a river.
Everybody joins in rescuing him, bears get the toys,
Tymoteusz gets medals and they all part as friends.
"Autumn Adventure of Tymoteusz" takes place
in the woods where our hero looks for mushrooms. As
it turns out he sits on a mushroom that starts growing
and Tymoteusz falls to the ground. He cannot pick
the mushroom but he spots Fox dressed as a hunter.
Fox runs away when he sees Tymoteusz, shots are
heard, wounded little Hare appears and Tymoteusz
hides him in a basket under toadstools. On the way
home he loses the Hare but finds him with the help of
Father and they scare away Fox who was going to
shoot them down.
39
The action of "Tymoteusz of All Trades" takes
place in a garage. Mrs. Storyteller thinks that Fox is
the owner of it and asks him to repair her car Fox,
greedy for tinkling coins, starts working on a car with
Tymoteusz. The car gets completely broken down
and angry Fox tells four small bears to get into the
engine and move the car Mrs. Storyteller nearly
pays the money but the bears smash the car. Fox
escapes and Father comes back. He makes
Tymoteusz and his friends repair the car. A song
ends one more story about Tymoteusz.
Wilkowski's hero is a teddy bear, the first child's
toy and, at the same time, traditional fairy-tale
character. Here it is treated very specifically, on
the basis of child's psychology with the respect for
the rich inner world of children's feelings, their
imagination and creative abilities. The stories are
very dynamic, full of unusual adventures that happen
to our hero when he meets the world for the first
time. The situations always end with a moral but it
is far from boring didacticism, moralizing or
admonishing. Tymoteusz's world is not controlled by
grown-ups and their experience. It is the world of
spontaneous feelings of a child, full of moving
simplicity, peotic imagination and humour. All the
plays about Tymoteusz are written with an absolute
sense of theatre and dramatic composition. They are
a great success in puppet-shows.
Wilkowski's output also includes a few plays
where puppets and people act together (e.g., "Ula z
lb", Ula from the 1st Form), a one-act play for adults
about a folk sculptor whose sculptures revolt,
"Spowiedz w drewnis" (Wooden Confession), a
contemporary fairy-tale (written together with
Elzbieta Burakowska), "Cybemetyczny pies"
(Cybernetic Dog) and a stage adaptation of a well-
known children's story by Kornel Makuszynski,
"Szewc Kopytko i kaczor K wak" (Kopytko the
Shoemaker and Kwak the Duck).
40
Still another part of Wilkowski's work are
television plays for children with such series as:
"Teatrzyk w koszu" (Theatre in a Basket -- 1960-
1964), "Ula i swiat" (Ula and the World - fifty short
plays written in 1964-1968) and "Przygoda skrzata
D ziecielinka" (Adventures of Imp D ziecielinek -
1970-1971 ).
"Smiling playwriting"
children agree.
say the critics and
Soviet-American Cooperation in FUm Studies and
Production: Achievements and Prospects
In the general atmosphere of cultural renewal
that has been spreading over the USSR for a little
more than one year, perhaps no other field has
responded to the Party directives with more
enthusiasm and concrete actions than the cinema
industry. A few key events illustrate this trend.
A major bureaucratic shakeup started in May
last year, at the V Congress of the Filmmakers
Union. On that occasion three fourths of the Union's
bureaucratic apparatus was replaced with younger
members actually involved in film production and
criticism. For the first time nominations to official
posts were not prearranged, and this allowed the up-
to-then controversial film director Elem Klimov to
be elected First Secretary of the Union. Six months
later, in December, it was the turn of Goskino (the
State Committee for Cinematography) to have its
head replaced. The new director, Alexander
Kamshalov, is a typical exponent of the new breed of
Party functionaries who emerged with Gorbachev.
He comes from the Party ranks, and one can expect
him to provide Goskino with energetic leadership,
informed decisions, and a policy which favors artistic
expression.
A sure sign of a change of policy toward film
production and distribution was the release of films
that had been shelved for years. Such was the case
41
with Klimov's Rasputin, German's Test on the Roads
and his more recent My Friend Ivan Lapshin, and
Abuladze's Repentance. This last film has been
shown only to selected audiences so far, but it is
expected to be put on the regular circuit in the near
future. . Its release is an eloquent example of the
leadership's commitment to "openness" in the cultural
sphere. The new Secretary of the Filmmakers Union
has appointed a commission to review all the films
that have been shelved over the years, in order to
bring out valuable works which suffered because of
obtuse censorship.
Problems that have hindered film production for
decades are now openly discussed in the official
press. There is a call for autonomy of decision within
the studios in financial as well as artistic matters,
and frank criticism of the bureaucratic apparatus
that used to stifle creativity. But not all the blame
is placed on the administrative side. Directors,
screenwriters, and critics are blamed as well for the
"greyishness" that colored most of the national film
production. They are blamed for being too timid, too
complacent, too obsequious to conventions, and are
encouraged to nurture their talent and individual
inspiration giving them full expression. In the final
analysis, it's not just the film industry that is placed
under discussion, but the individual as a responsible
member of society. The issue has become a moral
one.
This intellectual and administrative turmoil has
favored the emergence of young talent. We should
keep in view upcoming films, such as The Voice of
One Man by director Alexander Sakurov, the
fantastic tales of director Ovcharov (Nebylitsa and
N eskladukha, the titles are practically
untranslatable}, The Letters of a Dead Man by
Konstantin Lopushanksky, and The Flight of the
Sparrows by Timur Babluani.
Western critics of the current events will argue
that this new trend actually reflects new Party
42
directives of bureaucratic shakeup, economic
reforms, and social uplift, and therefore that the
policy toward the arts will be implemented only as
long as it serves the government's plans. This may
very well be true. However, the fact that
liberalization comes from above does not alter the
positive, although still modest, results. Furthermore,
certain changes in the socio-political and cultural
spheres entail an irreversible process. Even if the
policy is .reversed, what has been gained will remain
in the consciousness of the nation. Therefore, there
are reasons to look with optimism at the ferment
that is reshaping and revitalizing the Soviet cinema
industry.
One aspect of the new trend that involves us
more directly is a desire for cooperation with the
U.S., both in cinema studies and production. As a
result, a n u m e ~ of initiatives have been taken, and
promising developments await us in the future. Last
fall the Kennan Institute of the Wilson Center
sponsored an international Conference on Soviet
Cinema, which hosted specialists from Western
Europe and the Soviet Union, in addition to American
scholars. This was the first major symposium held in
the U.S. which was dedicated exclusively to Soviet
cinema. The participation of a Soviet delegation,
headed by Vladimir Braskakov, the Director of the
State Institute of Film Art (VNIIK), and including
Alex Adamovich, a major novelist and screenwriter,
gave this conference an unusual breadth of scope.
Usually, at our academic meetings we do not hear the
Soviet side, and are deprived of the possibility of a
direct exchange. This conference not only provided a
forum for discussion of scholarly topics, but hosted a
round table on exchanges and cooperation which has
already produced concrete results. Following those
preliminary talks, a Soviet-American joint
Commission on Cinema Studies is being established
nnder the auspices of the American Council of
Learned Societies and IREX on the American side,
and Goskino and the Filmmakers Union on the Soviet
43
side. The two sides will possibly get together as
early as this spring to discuss joint projects, such as
symposia, festivals, teleconferences, exchanges of
specialists, films, and printed materials. Film
production and distribution will not be included in the
works of the Commission at this stage, but they will
be considered for future developments. The
American Commission invites suggestions from the
field as to which specific projects are desirable and
which institutions are willing to implement them,
with the administrative assistance of !REX.
The Kennan Institute conference has created an
awareness of the fact that cinema is a neglected area
in the field of Soviet studies in this country. And
yet, cinema's importance both as an art form and an
index of cultural, political, and economic trends is
undeniable By allowing more room to visual media
such as cinema and television in their area studies
curricula, American universities would engender a
wider and deeper understanding of the Soviet Union.
The same is true, parenthetically, for academic think
tanks and government agencies. George Washington
University's School of Public and International
Affairs is taking decisive steps in this direction. The
School is now seeking funds to expand its Soviet
studies programs in the visual media with a view to
the establishment of a Center for Studies in Soviet
Cinema and Television. Eventually, the Center will
promote research, teaching, exchanges, dissemination
of information, and outreach activities such as
symposia, festivals, and teleconferences. As
relations with the Soviet cinema industry become
more official and structured due to the work of the
ACLS/Goskino Commission on Cinema Studies, the
GWU Center may serve as a clearinghouse and major
headquarters for projects generated in the field at
large.
In the course of the last year, Goskino and the
Filmmakers Union have been literally flooded with
proposals from American private and public
enterprises. This upsurge of interest has created
44
some confusion in a bureaucracy rmaccustomed to
individual, rmcoordinated initiatives. Consequently,
only a few projects have been approved and carried
out. Among them, besides the already mentioned
Conference on Soviet Cinema, was the film festival
"A Salute to the Soviet Republics," organized by the
International Film Exchange, Inc., and sponsored by
the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the
Smithsonian Resident Associates in Washington,
D.C. On that occasion, Elem Klimov came to the
United States on his first visit, together with another
film director, Albert Mkrtchian. Their presence
stirred an unprecedented wave of interest in the
American press, as well as among the scholarly
community and the film industry. Several joint
projects were discussed. Among them is an
"Entertainment Summit" which is supposed to take
place in Los Angeles in the spring, and will bring
together movie directors, producers, and actors to
get better acquainted with each other's culture and
exchange ideas and experiences. Also in the fall,
another Soviet film director, Savva Kulish, came to
the U.S. to present his film Fouettee at the Chicago
Film Festival, and to find an American coproducer
for his last film The Last Ship. On the Soviet side,
the script has been approved by Goskino and the
money already allocated for coproduction. Kulish
spent a few days in Washington, and gave a very
informative and open talk at the Kennan Institute.
This is by no means an exhaustive picture of the
state of affairs in the field, especially where
production is concerned. For example, Armand
Hammer Productions that has produced films in the
Soviet Union in the past is now planning to make a
documentary on Chernobyl.
So, it seems a warm wind is blowing from the
East. One should be aware, as skeptical observers
correctly warn us, that the fan is still firmly in the
hands of the Party and can be switched off as easily
45
as it was switched on. On the other hand, while it's
spring why not take advantage of the thaw?
Anna Lawton, Purdue University
Jewish Themes on the Moscow Stage
The attitude of the Soviets towards the Jews at
the present time continues to be multi-faceted and
ambiguous. Attacks against Zionism and the State of
Israel have accelerated, and are easily recognized as
but thinly-veiled attacks against Jews in general,
particularly those in the Soviet Union. By the same
token, Gorbachev has repeatedly stated that anti-
Semitism is anti-Soviet behavior and will be
prosecuted in accordance with the Constitution.
During the first full year of the Gorbachev
regime the number of Jewish emigres was cut to a
mere trickle -- the lowest number in the past two
decades; however, recent reports indicate that
approximately 1,000 Jews were allowed to emigrate
in January and February, and that this liberalization
would continue for the foreseeable future. On the
other hand, Jews who demonstrate for exit visas are
frequently physically assaulted by KGB
11
goon
squads." Nevertheless, although it is true that
religious observance is at least as restricted as during
the past twenty years, a number of Jewish dissidents
who had fought for religious tolerance and had been
imprisoned for this have now been released.
Although Gorbachev has promised equal
opportunity for all, it is still virtually impossible for
a Jew to enter Moscow State University except with
a tremendous bribe. This is justified with the
statement that, since Judaism, according to Soviet
law, is not a religion but a nationality, there has to
be some balance to allow for a number of admissions
for each nationality. And, since the Jews constitute
such a tiny percentage of the population, it cannot be
expected that a large number of seats at the major
46
university would be relegated to them to the
detriment of other, larger nationalities - a Soviet
version of the "quota system" which, incidentally,
affects not only Jews, but also other "undesirable"
Soviet nationalities. But the Jews have their own
autonomous region, Birobidzhan, where they can live
as they like where the use of the Yiddish language is
encouraged, and where the publication of a Yiddish-
language journal (Sovietish Heimland) is supported by
the State.
The present official Soviet attitude concerning
the stage is just as ambivalent and unpredictable.
Most principal playwrights and directors, many of
whom are Jewish, are still waiting for clear policy
declarations covering the performing arts to be
pronounced by the Gorbachev regime. On the one
hand, there are constant reminders that "Socialist
Realism", the insistence that all art must have a
national, ideological and Party content, is still the
doctrine for all the arts. At the same time, some of
the more courageous directors have been staging
plays that most definitely do not fall within that
mold -- and have gotten away with it. Two of them,
Speak out... and The Last Visitor (discussed in
another article in this issue); appear to be in this
category, but are principally propagandistic but,
nevertheless, commendable examples of Gorbachev's
"glasnost" campaign.
This brings us to our main topic and to three
examples of the new Soviet approach to Jewish
themes on the Moscow stage
On several previous occasions, the Jewish
Musical Cameo Theater (JMCT), the principal
musical group in Birobidzhan, has come to Moscow to
perform before a predominantly Jewish audience.
The 1986 summer/ fall season was no exception. What
was definitely different was that the posters
advertising the events were pasted on billboards in
several conspicuous places right in the center of
Moscow. Also, tickets, which previously could be
47
obtained only at the box office, were easily available
at numerous theatre kiosks throughout the city. In
addition, quite a number of non-Jews were in
attendance at these performances which alas, were
of mediocre quality at best. There were evenings of
traditional Jewish folk music, and also a gala
performance of an operetta called Anatevka which
was primarily based on the Broadway musical Fiddler
on the Roof. Its success was primarily due to the
fact that for the first time, Soviet Central
Television, earlier this year, aired this performance
during prime time under the title Tevye the
Milkman. It was estimated that approximately 100
million Soviets watched it. There seems to be a plan
afoot to use the JMCT as proof to the outside world
that the Jews do enjoy full rights in the USSR. One
example of this is a four-page spread on the JMCT,
with photographs, in the Sept em her, 1986 issue of the
official Soviet publication Soviet Life.
The next example, the performance of Five
Stories by Isaak Babel (Piat rasskazov I. Babelia) was
quite different. It is one of the major plays of the
1986/87 season being performed on the main stage of
the Taganka Theater. It must be remembered that
the Taganka has been traditionally known as one of
the most interestingly innovative houses in Moscow,
particularly under the strong leadership of Iurii
Liubimov. Liubimov is now an expatriate but his
name and reputation still make tickets to the
Taganka among the most difficult to obtain. It is
therefore not at all unusual that tickets to the play in
question are a rare find. Isaak Babel, one of the
finest prose writers of the early Soviet period who
was later eliminated by Stalin, was partially
resurrected after Stalin's death. He has traditionally
been considered the outstanding representative of the
Odessa school of Jewish writers. AI though the
Soviets admit to his existence, it is truly impossible
to buy his w r ~ which are printed in only very small
editions. It was therefore a rare treat to attend a
performance in which theatrical versions of four of"
48
his short stories were presented. The audience was
predominantly non-Jewish, but thoroughly enjoyed
the play, the small group of musicians who played
traditional Jewish music in a lively rhythm, and even
the constant references to "our people" in the
script. The play was not particularly good. There
was virtually no improvisation since all the lines were
taken directly from Babel's stories. Also, the four
stories chosen were politically the most harmless
("Konkin," "Evening," "The Story of My Dovecot," and
"Awakening."). Nevertheless, the official
resurrection of Babel and his Jewish themes was a
"first" and was therefore considered a precedent by
the audience. The director is Efim Kucher, a yoWtg
man who didn't even rate having his name mentioned
in the printed program.
Our third and final example is by far the most
significant. It is the repertory performance of No. 40
Sholem Aleikhem Street (Ulitsa Sholom Aleikhema,
dom 40, which is to run the entire season of
1986/87. It was written by Arkadii Stavi tskii, one of
the better Jewish playwrights. The performance is at
one of the major Moscow houses, the Stanislavsky
Theater, located directly on Gorkii Street. The
overall responsibility for production is that of the
principal director A.G. Tovstonogov who himself has
won a number of major awards, and who is also the
son of G. Tovstonogov, certainly the most respected
director in the Soviet Union today. He was ably
assisted by a yoWtger director A. Rafikov.
Although the Stanislavsky Theater is a comparatively
large house, there were literally thousands of people
on the street begging for tickets. It seemed as if the
major portion of the Jewish population of Moscow
was there. The theme of the play was a fascinating
one, since it was totally unexpected and
Wlprecedented. As soon as the premise became
clear, there were gasps of disbelief from the
audience that the censors permitted it to be
performed.
49
The action takes pl,ace in a Jewish section of
Odessa, in the home of what would here by called an
upper-middle-class Jewish family. The members of
this family consist of an elderly, typically Jewish
worn an (even her Russi an had a strong Jewish
inflection), the main role of the play, superbly
portrayed by R. Bykova; her husband, an old man who
is still working in the local government and who loves
his everyday existence and doesn't want it to change;
an older son, a professional who is quite successful,
whose daughter is attractive, but a punker who has
gotten into bad company; a younger son who is a
talented surgeon but who cannot get the
advancement he deserves - it is implied that his
being a Jew holds him back unfairly. The two sons
decide that they can no longer cope with Soviet
society and decide to emigrate to the United States
via Israel.
This causes extreme disruption within the
family. Although the mother loves her home, she
decides to leave with her children. Her
granddaughter doesn't want to leave, partly because
she rebels against all authority, but particularly
because she is ambivalent about a young man who is
right before his doctoral examination in the sciences,
and who is in love with her. The grandfather is
totally shocked by the plan and absolutely refuses to
tear himself away from the home. He makes
references to how terrible it used to be for the Jews
(obviously under Stalin) compared to how things are
now, and how they all fought together against the
nazis. Nevertheless he realizes that, in the final
outcome, he will have to accompany his family. Near
the end of the play he commits suicide. His wife
stays behind as her moral commitment to him. The
rest of the family departs. The young scientist
continues professing his love for the young girl
although he realizes, as does his father, that his
career is over because of this "anti-Soviet"
attachment. The entire family is destroyed.
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The play is filled with innuendos and unvoiced
commentary on the position of the Jews in the
USSR. For example, the centerpiece of the
apartment is a large breakfront which has been in the
family for generations. The mother, who is
extremely attached to it, realizes that she will have
to leave it behind. She therefore offers it as a gift to
several of her non-Jewish neighbors. They all refuse
although it is a handsome piece of furniture, virtually
unobtainable on the Soviet market. Their refusal,
although never stated in so many words, is based on
their conviction that the possession of property
bestowed upon them by enemies of the state (as all
emigrants are), would have negative repercussions
upon their lives.
Another interesting relationship in the play is
the one which the family has with the janitor, a man
in his late eighties, who used. to be a nobleman and an
officer in the White Army during the Civil War. He
subtly but clearly finds a greater meeting of the
minds with the Jews than with the new "Soviet Man."
Of course the play cannot be more outspoken
because it would not have passed the censorship
otherwise. Nevertheless, despite some minor faults,
it is a courageous, artistically superb drama and, in
the eyes of most Moscow theatre-goers, a milestone
in the constant fight between playwright/director and
the Party.
At first glance, all three exampfes may seem
harmless and insignificant to the reader. Upon more
careful consideration, it must be admitted that they
are the product of a minority of the artistic
population who refuse to compromise their esthetic
and philosophical values to political considerations
and who continue to try to circumvent the censors.
They are to be lauded.
A word must also be added in an attempt to
explain why this virtual rash of Jewish mat erial has
recently entered the public Soviet eye. There are
several reasons for this. First of all, there is the
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attempt to show both the internal and outside world
that things are changing in the Soviet Union.
Gorbachev, an emerging expert in public relations,
wants to create the belief that the USSR is now an
open society. This is why many negative events (e.g.,
Chernobyl, the sinking of the freighter in the Black
Sea, the ~ i n k i n of the nuclear submarine in the
Atlantic, the hijacking of an Aeroflot plane, etc.),
which would ne-.rer have been mentioned or admitted
by the Soviets, are now printed on the front page of
Pravda. Another important reason is, that many
leading personalities in the artistic world, and a
disproportionate num her of them are Jewish, are
putting increased pressure on the Party for greater
artistic freedom. Since its major concerns are now
international, the Party has, for the present, lowered
its watchful, censoring eye just a bit - particularly
in those situations where little is to be lost and some
prestige is to be gained. Thirdly, there is no doubt
that Gorbachev, certainly the best educated and most
pragmatic leader the Soviet Union has had since
Lenin, feels that national objectives may, in some
situations, be attained more easily by conciliatory
moves than with a club. Contrary to former leaders,
Gorbachev is a member of the intelligentsia who
would like to have the support of his intellectual
equals. The majority of the latter is solidly behind
moves towards fewer artistic restraints. This is the
major reason for the recent wooing of emigres
including Aksenov, Rostropovich, Liubimov,
Earyslmikov and others, who have been offered the
opportunity to return to the USSR either on a
temporary or permanent basis.
Finally, and sadly, it must be recognized that
this loosening of the reins may only be temporary. It
is conceivable that tomorrow the Soviet state, for
political expediency, may initiate a return to the
heavy-handedness vis a vis the arts and religious and
ethnic minorities that have earmarked previous
regimes.
Leo Hecht, George Mason University
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