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One happy village buy tickets. Buy tickets for the play "One Absolutely Happy Village"

B. Vakhtin. "One absolutely happy village." Workshop of Pyotr Fomenko.
Director Petr Fomenko

The 1999/2000 theater season in Moscow closed with the premiere at the Fomenko Workshop. The play is based on the prose of Boris Vakhtin and is called “One Absolutely Happy Village.” It is played in the former premises of the Kyiv cinema, which, by the grace of the Moscow authorities, was given to the Pyotr Fomenko Theater.

In recent years, Pyotr Fomenko, named a general director in one of the critics' surveys, has worked in other theaters. At the Vakhtangov Theater he produced Pushkin’s “The Queen of Spades” and Maurice Maeterlinck’s “The Miracle of St. Anthony,” but his new work should be considered a real success. New job according to the old plan. Just as Yuri Lyubimov was only able to stage Shakespeare’s chronicles, banned 30 years ago, only in 1999, so Pyotr Fomenko began work on Boris Vakhtin’s story 30 years ago. It’s hard to understand now what the qualified censors got involved with, but only now P. Fomenko released the play “One Absolutely Happy Village.” And polls of theater critics conducted by newspapers at the end of the season show that the votes were divided equally between “The Black Monk” by Kama Ginkas and the premiere of the Fomenko Theater. It is characteristic that it is precisely between these two productions that demonstrate, on the one hand, an unprecedented level of production culture and integrity of the spectacle, and on the other hand, completely opposite worldviews. Gloomy, misanthropic - in Ginkas and filled with love for life and love for people - Fomenko.

The premises at the new Fomenko Theater are small. The auditorium can accommodate, God willing, a hundred people. They sit on two sides of the stage, but the space is completely played out. The action takes place not only on stage, but also on the steps of the audience, and in the lighting box, and somewhere behind the supposed scenes. The audience, thus, is located as if inside the performance, in the most absolutely happy village. Moreover, the wooden window shutters are painted with popular prints of village life - a river, a forest, a church. This is probably how Chagall, or Pirosmani, or one of the naive artists that the Moscow Dar gallery likes to present, would have painted the Russian landscape. The stage design is very conventional. Plank walkways, a well, basins, blue fabric - a river. Everything is very simple, made from natural materials. And the strong light of the spotlights - the sun floods the entire hall.

People play animals and objects - well, for example, a garden scarecrow, or a well crane (both of these roles, along with human ones, are played by Karen Badalov), or a tractor. Legs in black pants and boots protrude from the wooden fence, the legs twitch, the actor to whom the legs belong imitates the sound of a sputtering engine. Funny. The garden scarecrow is also funny - a living artist, suspended from a crossbar by the collar of his coat, wearing a hat with earflaps, constantly sliding down his sad face. The scarecrow has been standing here, apparently, for a whole century - it has seen everything, knows everything, evaluates everything impartially, sometimes - if it witnesses a love scene - it becomes shy and pulls its hat over its face.

Cows are depicted with a string with a bell wrapped around their neck and their hands clenched into fists extended forward with clay jugs on them - hooves. Theatrical memory itself tells you where you saw it for the first time. In “Kholstomer” by G. Tovstonogov, when the horse was played by Evgeny Lebedev. Pyotr Fomenko will remind you of this once again at the end of the performance, when a fake butterfly on a thin metal stem appears on stage: the dying Kholstomer saw such a butterfly from his childhood. And this was one of the most powerful theatrical impressions, forever imprinted in the mind.

...A stone by the road, a thin ribbon of a river, a cow or a person are living beings. Each one has its own personality, biography, and its own role in life.

P. Agureeva (Polina), S. Taramaev (Mikheev).
Photo by M. Guterman

The main difference between Fomenko’s performance and the legendary production of “Brothers and Sisters” at MDT is that it was a folk drama. Tectonic shifts in the layers of history, felt behind each individual fate. For Fomenko, history is fate itself, imposing certain conditions on people; it can kill an individual, but is unable to cope with the essential that is repeated from century to century. For example, with a cow or with love. In our case, with the love of the obstinate girl Polina and her persistent admirer Mikheev (Sergei Taramaev). The scene of Polina bathing in the river, with whom she talks about her eternal disagreements with Mikheev, is amazingly conceived and executed. Polina (Polina Agureeva) slowly and hesitantly moves along the flimsy bridge, turning herself into a long blue fabric - the river. And Mikheev, who overhears her confidential conversation with the river, unwinds the blue cloth, and the river meekly gives him the body of his beloved. This is where the garden scarecrow will blush, and the sophisticated and enlightened spectators in the area of erotica will lower their eyes in shame. Because this scene is chaste and completely intimate. It is played by actors with such a degree of authenticity that the viewer finds himself in the position of a person spying on the birth of a feeling. Clean, like the river itself, warm, like the bright spring sun.

This love will give rise to a new life. And almost at the same moment, Polina’s grandfather, like an epic hero, clinging to the ground, will hear that she is trembling, and will say that she is trembling - for war. The earth really trembles, because the grandfather (Karen Badalov) lying on the wooden walkways, like a frightened bird with his wings, hits them with his elbows - and everyone hears the clatter of carriage wheels.

There would be no happiness, but misfortune would help - says the Russian proverb. If there had not been a war, Polina would not have left an unexpected child, and would not have agreed to marry Mikheev. And then the wedding will begin to sing, the wedding will begin to sing, and the village women will scream in every possible way, some heavy sound will utter, the heavy black shutters on the windows will move - the war will begin. And almost having quarreled with his young wife, Mikheev will go to war.

At the front, as in peaceful life, Mikheev will chat with a young soldier about women and his beloved wife, and under the endless conversation he will tremble and fall. Killed. Dead. Dead is the wrong word. Because there is nothing dead in Fomenko’s performance. And Mikheev, charming, smiling, forelock and blue-eyed, taking off his military uniform, will climb up to the ceiling, lie down on the hammock stretched out there and begin to watch how important military men will be sent to the next world, that is, to the same hammock, endowed with ranks, a young soldier with the amusing surname Kuropyatnikov.

And, swinging on a heavenly hammock, Mikheev will, as if nothing had happened, talk and sing with his beloved Polina.

S. Taramaev (Mikheev), T. Motskus (Kuropyatnikov).
Photo by M. Guterman

After all, it was possible to talk about her life as a widow with anguish and tears: about how she worked 20 hours a day, and about how she stole potatoes to feed her twins, and about how she fought off the annoying advances of the foreman , and in general about how difficult the female lot is. This text is there, but there is no strain or sentiment. And those whose lot is hard - there is no doubt - dressed in shapeless padded jackets, woolen socks and galoshes, wrapped in coarse scarves, hiding their faces almost up to their eyes - God, how good they are in an absolutely happy village. With what slyness and tenderness these eyes, the only ones visible on faces, sparkle. How they sing - Russian and Cossack songs or the famous, thanks to Klavdia Shulzhenko, Argentine “Chelita”! How young, and slender, and snow-white, barely noticeable from under long skirts legs. Village simpletons are proud, sensual, as if they were truly Argentine beauties. Should these women moan and grieve when they need to survive? Should they be jealous and lecture their murdered husbands?

Mikheev will teach his Polina to find a new husband. In the prose of the 60s and in the play of 2000 they will respond folk songs: “Black Raven” or “Deaf in that steppe” - after all, there is the last parting word of a dying man to his wife: “And also tell her, let her not be sad, she will marry the one who is dear to her heart” or “Tell her, she is free, I married, but to someone else.” And Polina will bring her new husband into the house - the captured German Franz Karlovich, played by the very young Ilya Lyubimov. This Franz Karlovich appeared at the very beginning of the performance, when the earth was still shaking, almost in a Tyrolean cap and with a harmonica - a lip-blind boy, an unfortunate performer of someone else's and evil will. And again, neither captivity nor life in a foreign land and in a foreign language will make him unhappy. He will become happy thanks to Polina, her two boys and their two common girls. And the third melody will be woven into the fabric of the performance - Franz Karlovich will sing “Lili Marlene” to Polina. That is, the record will sing, he will only translate the words. And everyone who doesn't know German language, the translation will shock you. Lili Marlene will turn out to be not a frivolous song, but a piercingly tender song of love: “It was raining. Both of our shadows merged into one. Therefore, it was clear how much we love each other. Everyone should see us under this lantern, as it once was, Lili Marlene, as it once was.”

That's all that Pyotr Fomenko did. He translated prose into the language of theatrical poetry, one of the most terrible pages of Russian history (war) into the language of love, a story about death into the language of religion, which says that the soul is immortal, and the crucifixion is followed by resurrection. It is difficult to say where this absolutely happy village is located. Maybe not on our sinful earth, but in the memories of people swinging on heavenly hammocks.

In Pyotr Fomenko's version, Boris Vakhtin's One Absolutely Happy Village is reminiscent of Thornton Wilder's great play Our Town. Its first part describes the life of a small American town, and its second describes the conversations of the dead in the cemetery. All they do is remember their friends and relatives who are still alive and discuss completely earthly problems. But what in this world was perceived as misfortune, drama, tragedy, misfortune, in the next seems something cozy, sweet, bright and almost fabulous. This is what happened with Pyotr Fomenko. Russian village by impressionist or primitivist brushes, painted with wet, sensual, bright, free strokes. And this may be the only performance modern Russia, in which there is not a word about faith and God, but which one would like to call Christian, because Love is poured in it.

Upcoming execution dates

The desire to introduce viewers to the poetic world of Vakhtin’s prose, to find an atmosphere akin to the author, led the creators of the play to the form of sketches, stage sketches, extremely conventional and open to the audience’s perception. The search for intonation, the fine line between convention and authenticity of experience was central to this work. In the unusual play space of the Workshop, it was important to recreate the special figurative structure of the story, which combines real life, fantasy, and a dream, where a cow, a well with a crane, and a garden scarecrow act, and the main characters are the River, the Earth, and the Village. “...And about an absolutely happy village - this is not a story or a poem, it’s just a song... And war broke into this song...”

Awards
laureate of the “Golden Mask” award in the category “Drama - Small Form Performance”, 2001
Pyotr Fomenko was nominated for the Golden Mask award in the Drama category. Best work director", 2001
Polina Agureeva was nominated for the Golden Mask Award in the Drama - Best Actress category, 2001
Sergei Taramaev was nominated for the Golden Mask award in the Drama - Best Actor category, 2001
Laureate of the International Prize named after. K. S. Stanislavsky 2000 in the category “Best Performance of the Season”
Polina Agureeva is the winner of the 2001 “Idol” award in the “Hope of the Year” nomination for the role of Polina.

The performance was shown in St. Petersburg and Dresden (Germany).

Reviews from spectators of the performance on the forum can be read using the hashtag

ATTENTION! During the performance, performing the creative tasks set by the director and the author's remarks, the actors smoke on stage. Please take this information into account when planning your visit to the performance.

Fomenko is one of the few directors who know how to extract magical theatricality from the most ordinary objects and phenomena. Vakhtin's story tells about the war, but it is not a chronicle of battles and victories, but an attempt to comprehend the meaning of this tragic event in life ordinary people. War only complicates the flow of life, but is not able to interrupt it. It is perceived as a huge stone blocking the river. But the time comes, the river gains strength, overflows the stone and calmly flows along its previous bed. Olga Romantsova, Century having crossed a certain spiritual threshold and looking at it a little from the outside...
In fact, this is a lyrical confession of the wonderful director Pyotr Fomenko, who staged sketches based on Boris Vakhtin’s story “One Absolutely Happy Village” in his Workshop: the performance is touching and simple, filled with a piercing feeling of the charm and doom of existence...
Alexey Filippov, Izvestia ...Fomenko glorified the spare realism of the Soviet village in the language of a pagan poet. Maya Odin, “Today” During the performance, the “Fomenki” and their heroes make a gradual journey from the animation of things, mechanisms, animals, rivers to the animation of humans, the animation of life. From pure play to pure living. From earthly, horizontal life - to spiritual, vertical life. Precisely spiritual - not spiritual. Let's leave the spiritual to the ideologists and ethicists. And here, without any commandments or canons, they comprehend the simple truth that they go to war in order to return from it. That our dead do not disappear from us, they are nearby, and love does not end with their death. It’s just that since we have been given the opportunity to live on, we must, we are obliged to love the living. Love is the only justification for our life. Olga Fuks, “Evening Moscow” That’s all that Pyotr Fomenko did. He put his loved ones and loving people under the gentle lantern of your memory. Everyday life was aestheticized. He skillfully performed an artless performance. He translated prose into the language of theatrical poetry, one of the most terrible pages of Russian history (war) into the language of love, a story about death into the language of religion, which says that the soul is immortal, and after the crucifixion comes resurrection...
Pyotr Fomenko staged perhaps the only performance in modern Russia in which there is not a word about faith and God, but which one would like to call Christian, because Love is poured into it. Marina Timasheva, “First of September”

Upcoming execution dates

Awards
laureate of the “Golden Mask” award in the category “Drama - Small Form Performance”, 2001
Pyotr Fomenko was nominated for the Golden Mask award in the Drama - Best Director's category, 2001
Polina Agureeva was nominated for the Golden Mask Award in the Drama - Best Actress category, 2001
Sergei Taramaev was nominated for the Golden Mask award in the Drama - Best Actor category, 2001
Laureate of the International Prize named after. K. S. Stanislavsky 2000 in the category “Best Performance of the Season”
Polina Agureeva is the winner of the 2001 “Idol” award in the “Hope of the Year” nomination for the role of Polina.

The performance was shown in St. Petersburg and Dresden (Germany).

Reviews from spectators of the performance on the forum can be read using the hashtag #oneabsolutelyhappyvillage

Fomenko is one of the few directors who know how to extract magical theatricality from the most ordinary objects and phenomena. Vakhtin's story tells about the war, but it is not a chronicle of battles and victories, but an attempt to comprehend the meaning of this tragic event in the lives of ordinary people. War only complicates the flow of life, but is not able to interrupt it. It is perceived as a huge stone blocking the river. But the time comes, the river gains strength, overflows the stone and calmly flows along its previous bed. Olga Romantsova, Century having crossed a certain spiritual threshold and looking at it a little from the outside...
In fact, this is a lyrical confession of the wonderful director Pyotr Fomenko, who staged sketches based on Boris Vakhtin’s story “One Absolutely Happy Village” in his Workshop: the performance is touching and simple, filled with a piercing feeling of the charm and doom of existence...
Alexey Filippov, Izvestia ...Fomenko glorified the spare realism of the Soviet village in the language of a pagan poet. Maya Odin, “Today” During the performance, the “Fomenki” and their heroes make a gradual journey from the animation of things, mechanisms, animals, rivers to the animation of humans, the animation of life. From pure play to pure living. From earthly, horizontal life - to spiritual, vertical life. Precisely spiritual - not spiritual. Let's leave the spiritual to the ideologists and ethicists. And here, without any commandments or canons, they comprehend the simple truth that they go to war in order to return from it. That our dead do not disappear from us, they are nearby, and love does not end with their death. It’s just that since we have been given the opportunity to live on, we must, we are obliged to love the living. Love is the only justification for our life. Olga Fuks, “Evening Moscow” That’s all that Pyotr Fomenko did. He placed his loved ones and loving people under the gentle lantern of his memory. Everyday life was aestheticized. He skillfully performed an artless performance. He translated prose into the language of theatrical poetry, one of the most terrible pages of Russian history (war) into the language of love, a story about death into the language of religion, which says that the soul is immortal, and after the crucifixion comes resurrection...
Pyotr Fomenko staged perhaps the only performance in modern Russia in which there is not a word about faith and God, but which one would like to call Christian, because Love is poured into it. Marina Timasheva, “First of September”

Pyotr Naumovich Fomenko is a force of nature, an unpredictable theatrical phenomenon, an inexplicable phenomenon. Perhaps there has not been a director in modern Russia who thinks more paradoxically and who knows how to “explode” a situation, turning its meaning upside down. Whatever he takes on, a classic or something unknown to few people modern work, it was always impossible to predict what was happening on stage until the day of the premiere. So “One Absolutely Happy Village,” based on the work of the undeservedly forgotten Soviet author Boris Vakhtin, created a sensation in its time.

About the play “One Absolutely Happy Village”

“One Absolutely Happy Village” is a performance that has become a classic of the repertoire of the Pyotr Fomenko Workshop. Unfortunately, the director who staged it is no longer alive and sooner or later the production will go down in history. And now this is a unique opportunity to “touch” the work of a paradoxical genius who has become a unique theatrical phenomenon - Pyotr Fomenko.

While working on this production, Pyotr Naumovich tried to create an atmosphere on stage that was as close as possible to the story described by the author. To do this, he chose the form of stage sketches in which life, fantasy, and dreams are intertwined. And, of course, they all have one thing in common common topic- the beginning of a war that forever (or not forever?) changes the life of “One Absolutely Happy Village.” In the center of events is the pregnant Polina, who with tears sees off her newly-made husband to the war and almost immediately receives a funeral. But he still returns to his beloved, in the form of either an angel or a cloud, and even conducts a dialogue with her.

The premiere of the play “One Absolutely Happy Village” at the Pyotr Fomenko Workshop Theater took place on June 20, 2000. At the end of the season, he became a laureate of the international prize named after. K.S. Stanislavsky in the category “Best Performance”. And already in 2001 he was awarded the Golden Mask award in the Drama - Small Form Performance category.

Those without whom the play “One Absolutely Happy Village” might not have happened

Despite the fact that Pyotr Naumovich Fomenko has not been with us for a long time, his performances, and he staged more than 60 of them during his life, continue to live. Last years he worked only in his own theater, on the stage of which he presented to the audience “Theatrical Novel (Notes of a Dead Man)” based on M.A. Bulgakov, “Triplich” based on A.S. Pushkin and other works.

The play “One Absolutely Happy Village” became one of his most striking productions, conquering the theater stage not only in Moscow, but also in St. Petersburg and Dresden. Not only the choice of the work taken as a basis, its interpretation, but also the cast involved were unexpected. The main roles were played by Polina Agureeva and Evgeny Tsyganov. Together with them in “One Absolutely Happy Village” Oleg Lyubimov, Karen Badalov, Madeleine Dzhabrailova and others play.

How to buy tickets to the show

Every year it becomes more and more difficult to buy tickets for the play “One Absolutely Happy Village”; in 2018, their cost reaches 20,000 rubles. Which, in general, is not surprising, because in this production “the stars aligned” on stage - always a relevant theme, thoughtful author’s reasoning, talented actors and brilliant direction. But we are ready to do the almost impossible and help you. Each of our clients can count not only on the coveted tickets, but also on:

consultation with an experienced manager who will answer all your questions and help you choose the ideal option in terms of price-quality ratio;
free delivery of orders in Moscow and St. Petersburg;
discount when purchasing more than 10 tickets.

For your convenience, various payment methods are available - by bank card, transfer and even cash upon receipt of the order.

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