"Continuation of Prostokvashino" is an absolute success ": the head of Soyuzmultfilm told about current projects and studio plans

- Recently, “Soyuzmultfilm” once again had to defend intellectual property rights - I'm talking about the situation with the trademark with the image of Boniface. How often do such incidents occur?

“Unfortunately, at every step, studios have to deal with such situations — after all, for so many years, the studio either distributed it, or simply did not follow its intellectual products and rights. Hence a lot of “piracy”, a lot of violations of studio rights regarding the use of characters. Today we are in the process of probably at least ten court cases. And about ten today we have already won. Every time we have to go to justice to defend the rights of our characters.

- Has it ever happened that the trials did not end in favor of the studio?

- In my time there is no, thank God. And I’ll soon be heading the studio for two years.

- Clarify the situation with the refusal of the presence of "Soyuzmultfilm" in the amusement park "Dream Island". What caused the controversy?

- The question is purely commercial. There is no other reason. The fact is that the contract that the previous management of Soyuzmultfilm signed with the creators of the park turned out to be very unprofitable for the studio. In our opinion, it was concluded on discriminatory conditions for Soyuzmultfilm - in comparison with international animation studios.

When we accidentally found out about the conditions on which the park entered into agreements with international studios, we returned with a proposal to revise the contract. The organizers of the park did not consider this possible and proper for themselves, and we very peacefully, friendly dispersed.

- And when should we expect the opening of the Soyuzmultfilm museum at VDNH?

- In the fourth quarter of 2019 - the first quarter of 2020. That is, from the beginning to the end of next winter. It all depends on how soon the construction work will be completed and how quickly we get the equipment. But the plan is such that after a year and a half, visitors will be able to see this museum.

- As far as I understand, the reconstruction of the future museum is underway ...

- That's right - it has just begun. Therefore, the reconstruction of the pavilion itself should be completed by the summer. I think that by the end of the summer we will be able to go inside to do the equipment and the so-called thematization - that is, to create an interior that will turn into an interactive museum "Soyuzmultfilm".

• © Frame from the cartoon "Prostokvashino" (2018)

- What are the ways of dialogue with the audience of the XXI century ready "Soyuzmultfilm"? We are talking about such non-standard solutions as, for example, creating a Sharik dog account on Instagram.

- There will be a lot of such non-standard solutions. We, as creative people, who work a lot - and the studio works almost 20 hours a day! - all the time they must find some non-standard creative solutions for themselves and for the team. I think you will see many more of these things.

We have planned a very beautiful story with a cat Matroskin. I will not tell you yet, otherwise my colleagues will be offended with me - they prepare it as special news. But I’ll open the veil of secrecy: Anton Tabakov and the cat Matroskin, whom he is voicing, will take part in it. It will be some kind of interactive story.

In addition, this year we are doing a very large collaboration with GUM and Bosco. When this year, before the New Year holidays, you enter the GUM store, you will be very surprised. Because the whole GUM, the skating rink and the fair on the square will be decorated with the characters of Soyuzmultfilm. Christmas trees are decorated by our characters. We also make a collection of clothes for the New Year with the characters of the studio. This is a very big and, I think, a very significant collaboration for both parties.

- Eight episodes of Prostokvashin from the planned 30 appeared in the network. Intermediate results can already be summed up Did Prostokvashino justify the studio's expectations?

- In my opinion, the continuation of Prostokvashino is an absolute success, an unconditional studio triumph. And, probably, the first continuation in history, which can be compared in popularity and love of contemporary children and adults with its beautiful start.

To date, eight episodes have been released. The eighth came out literally three days ago and in three days already gained a half million views on our YouTube channel. All other series, which came out a month or two months ago, scored more than three million views. The first series has collected more than 25 million views. Therefore, we, of course, are very pleased with the way Prostokvashino goes.

TV channels "Carousel" and "Mult", which show our series, show them all the time. A very high rotation of the cartoon on the channel shows that he has high ratings. I think this is an absolute success!

We hope that all the other 22 series that we will release this season, as well as future series that we are going to produce next, will also be pleasant to the viewers.

- I remember, at first, after the release of the first series, many viewers criticized the animated series. Did the studio take into account their comments?

- There was a lot of criticism. The first series so plunged us into a lot of criticism ... Of the 25 million who looked, 12 million said it was terrible, that it was a nightmare.

Interesting statistics. Now, in the eighth series, the percentage of those who put a dislike or write a bad comment has decreased to 5% from 100% of those who looked.

"Baba Yaga against" always exists in our society. There will be those who do not like it, but it’s good for us that they exist: because they are a driver for change for us, a driver for hearing society. We changed a lot after the first series. I will not disclose secrets right now, but we have heard a great deal from what our viewers said. We have heard and applied all constructive criticism.

• © Scene from the cartoon “Hofmaniada” (2016)

- How would you rate the results of the Hoffmaniad project? Was this movie successful at the box office?

- You know, we did not expect from him any huge successes at the box office: we understood that this was an art-house film, a film not for a wide audience, difficult enough for perception.

Seeing “Hoffmaniad” is like going to a complex exhibition in a museum. This is art. Exhibitions do not bring money, and we did not expect them.

But the fact is that this film has a very long further museum and exhibition fate. Already for five years ahead we have a plan for the museum-expositional activity of the “Hoffmaniada” - both for dolls, and for scenery, and for watching a film as part of the show of these exhibitions. Therefore, we think that “Hofmaniada” is still very much, including in commercial terms, it can earn for the studio.

- Tell us about the studio plans for 2019.

- There are many plans both in terms of content production of our main activity, and in terms of various events. And also in our third direction, which we now also consider very important for us - this is an educational direction. We launched it to Soyuzmultfilm recently, but it is already moving at an incredible pace and very efficiently.

Pro production. Next year, two full-length films to which we are related will be released immediately. One is produced by Soyuzmultfilm together with the Gorky film studio. This is a full-length animated film "Suvorov", which we expect at the box office in the summer.

The second is a film where we were co-producers, entitled “The Snow Queen”. It will be released on January 1, 2019. At least five television series Soyuzmultfilm will appear on television channels - not counting Prostokvashin.

- And at what stage is the work on the animated film about the Kesh parrot?

- The film about the Kesh parrot is in development at a very early stage - the creation of the script and, in fact, an agreement with the author Alexander Efimovich Kurlyandsky about how we could produce this film together. We are in the process, but this is not a question next year. I think that in about two years we will be able to watch this movie.

- You also mentioned the puppet film about the childhood of Catherine II ...

- This film is not a puppet, but made in 2D, hand-drawn animation. In general, this is the author's short cycle "The Empress's Tales", from which two films should be prepared this year - about the childhood of Peter the Great and Catherine the Great. They should come out, I think, by the end of this - the beginning of next year.

• © Scene from the cartoon The Return of the Prodigal Parrot (1984)

- How do you assess the likelihood of “Soyuzmultfilm” refusal of state subsidies in the next 2.5 years (the Minister of Culture set this task for the studio six months ago)?

- I think it is quite possible. We are moving at an incredibly fast pace in terms of growth. And if in these two and a half years the state will seriously support the animation not in the form of the small subsidy that we receive (and from which we think we will be able to refuse in two and a half years), but in the form of some large-scale support that is needed to get private money in there ...

You see, private money comes where government money goes - this is a kind of guarantee for investors that they will get their investments back. Therefore, for every ruble of invested public money, we are able to attract the ruble of not public money, but private money. But for this we need to increase the amount of public funding.

If this happens, we, of course, can easily exist without state subsidies at all. I mean the livelihoods. And the state supports projects in all countries. For example, I will tell you, in France, the state supports animation studios in the production of projects that are twice as large in volume as is happening in Russia.

- How is Soyuzmultfilm planning to promote its projects abroad?

- We are already doing a lot in this area. This year, Soyuzmultfilm was first presented at the Cannes Television Film Festival. And not just as a participant of the stand: for the first time we brought back all our projects, all series (in the form of the first series), all full-length films (in the form of commercials and teasers duplicated into English), which could be watched in full. They were included in the catalog of the telemarket that went through there.

As a result, we received a lot of requests from international companies and on co-production joint projects, and on the co-financing of our projects that are of interest to them, and on the distribution of our projects abroad. I think that in the next three years our main vector, apart from development and production in Russia, will be directed to international markets.