On the stage of the branch of the theater.
Pushkin hosted the premiere of the play "Switzerland" directed by Tatyana Tarasova based on the play of the same name by the Australian playwright Joanna Murray-Smith.
This is the story of short moments of life, love and death of Patricia Highsmith, the author of novels about one of the most complex, multifaceted and controversial heroes of modern literature - the talented Mr. Ripley.
The premiere also attracts attention by the fact that 2021 marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Highsmith, whose work is now experiencing an unexpected belated renaissance.
At the beginning of this year, another biography of the writer was published, in which she appears in an even more unattractive light than in the previous memoir versions.
The first season of the series "Ripley" (starring Andrew Scott), which is based on all five novels by Patricia Highsmith about Tom Ripley, a handsome adventurer with impeccable taste and a cold-blooded maniac, is scheduled for late autumn.
Already at the stage of reading the play Switzerland, which took place within the framework of the Foreign Readings project at the Pushkin Theater last autumn, there was obviously an amazing combination of dramatic material, an accurate director's feeling of the fabric of the work and the completely cosmic interaction of actors with each other.
The text of the play is a linguistic pleasure.
Performed by Vera Voronkova and Fyodor Levin, he is able to hypnotize the viewer.
The plot itself contains a polyphony of meanings and themes: from Freudianism with its main motive - "from childhood", to the total loneliness of the artist, his love and contempt for people, conflict with the professional community.
There is everything here at once: imagery, detective plot, and philosophy.
Tatiana Tarasova reveals in the play the world of thick and deep shadows in which Highsmith existed, as if inviting us to take a closer look at our own shadows in our lives.
The two-hour performance plunges the viewer into a deadly battle between two heroes.
He and she.
The rebel Highsmith and her esthete Ripley.
Well-known writer and timid publishing agent.
Murderer and victim.
Victim and killer.
Lover and mistress.
Mother and son ... A change of fate - that is, a change of personality - this is the main plot.
To be not yourself, but someone else, to jump out of your own destiny, as from a leaving carriage.
There is a lot of cold horror, tactile sex and absolutely unsurpassed humor in this performance.
But the main discovery is the duet of two wonderful actors of the Pushkin Theater Vera Voronkova and Fyodor Levin.
This is a real current, a lively and wounded penetration into each other and into the material.
© Olga Shvetsova
Voronkova emphasizes that the performance was made in the genre of a psychological thriller - in this genre, Patricia herself wrote.
And the author of the play very accurately preserved the style of her works.
“There is a lot of bile, irony and suffering, and in some places, frank, cynical humor.
For me, this story is about how important it is for an artist to create only according to those laws that he himself recognizes above himself.
And the Artist can be judged only by them.
That is why this material is valuable for me personally - consonance with my own thoughts and beliefs, ”said the actress.
Levin, who played Edward, admitted that for him the role of one of the most difficult literary characters of the second half of the 20th century was a challenge.
“This is probably one of the most difficult materials that I have ever encountered, and certainly the most confusing: the action takes place at the junction of reality and some other world (inspiration, memory, dreams, passions), and the characters themselves are so complex and multi-part, that you can understand and solve them endlessly.
It was incredible happiness to rehearse with Vera Voronkova;
such an experience and openness to experimenting on oneself inspires and pushes forward, even when it's dark and scary there, ”says Fyodor Levin.
“I wanted it to be a movie.
After all, everything that Patricia Highsmith wrote is very cinematic (with the help of the amazing artistic instinct of cameramen Polina and Sophie Nabok, we succeeded), ”explains the director Tatyana Tarasova.
According to her, the play "Switzerland" is about the loneliness and madness of the artist, which is especially painful at the end of his life.
A slow slide into disaster, the finale of everything: life, career, all desires, except for one - a delightfully beautiful death.
The director emphasizes that Patricia Highsmith is a brilliant writer and misanthrope who has given the world a new type of criminal, never before seen in literature.
She killed hundreds of people in her psychological thrillers and, at the last moment of her life, composed her own murder.
“And the more you read into the sensual and erotic ligature of her novels, the more you look into her“ abyss ”, the more you feel:“ The abyss is looking into you, ”adds Tarasova.
For her, the most exciting work on the play was the combination of the story of Patricia Highsmith and the actors - perceptive, deep, with an extraordinary nature and powerful energy of Vera and eccentric, sensual, with a rare stage charm of Fyodor.
“Both are unique and unpredictable.
Opening together with them layer by layer the exciting inaccessibility of someone else's darkness was a difficult happiness, ”the director concludes.