Premiere in a snuffbox. Maxim Matveev reincarnated as the most beautiful woman on the stage in England

Fans of adventurous, captivating, historical drama will be a pleasant discovery by the performance of Kynaston. Directed by Yevgeny Pisarev, based on the famous and popular play by American playwright Jeffrey Hatcher, the production takes viewers to England in the middle XVII century when the theater occupied a dominant place in the culture of the Restoration. It was at this time that cardinal changes took place in the nature of the conduct of dramatic and comedy productions. Shakespeare theater demanded that all female roles in performances be played by men.

This rule persisted for a long time: brutal actors played men, and young men beautiful ladies. But already in the second half of the seventeenth century, King Charles II issued a decree according to which now only actresses were to be on stage in female roles. Hatcher's play touches on this historical reality, which has become a problem for the protagonist of the play, actor Edward Kynaston. This outstanding artist, who really played on the stage of London theaters, captivated the audience with his brilliant female images.

But the release of the royal law put his career in jeopardy. Meanwhile, his constant costume designer Maria dreams of the stage, imitates Edward's movements, learns to imitate his demeanor during the performance. She knows by heart all the popular plays and one day she tries her hand at staging a little-known theater. But Maria's debut causes a great resonance in society, and now she is invited to a reception at the royal palace. To find out what awaits the heroes next, whether the former costume designer will help her former idol find a job, whether the girl will be able to overcome the temptation of fame, you must definitely buy tickets for the Kinaston performance.

MOSCOW, 8 September. /Corr. TASS Olga Svistunova/. The premiere of the play "Kynaston" based on the play by playwright and screenwriter Jeffrey Hatcher took place at the Moscow Theater under the direction of Oleg Tabakov. In the original, the play is called "Perfect Female Stage Beauty", which was embodied by the actor Maxim Matveev on the stage of the "Snuffbox".

"The premiere screenings were held on Wednesday and Thursday, and both evenings were sold out," the press service of the Tabakov Theater told TASS, adding that the series of premiere screenings will continue on September 21 and 22.

About the play

The play "Kynaston" (in the original "Perfect female stage beauty" - approx. TASS) was written by Jeffrey Hatcher in 2003. It tells about Edward Kynaston - an outstanding English actor of the Restoration. Then, in the 17th century, women were forbidden to play on stage, and all female roles were performed only by men. The best among them on the London stage was Edward Kynaston.

But overnight everything changed - Charles II issued a decree according to which now only women could play their roles in the theater. Kinaston was not needed, forgotten, but still the actor found strength in himself and returned to the stage already in a male role.

Hatcher's play was a success on Broadway and was filmed. In Russia, it was first staged on the stage of the Oleg Tabakov Theater by the artistic director of the Pushkin Theater, director Evgeny Pisarev. The scenography was made by Zinovy ​​Margolin, the costume designer was Maria Danilova. Cast: Maxim Matveev, Anya Chipovskaya, Kirill Rubtsov, Mikhail Khomyakov, Vitaly Egorov, Evgenia Borzykh, Artur Kasimov.

"Absolute Experiment"

“It started for me as an absolute experiment,” director Yevgeny Pisarev admitted to TASS. - I was not sure of anything: neither in the play, nor in myself, so I decided to make a performance not on my own territory - in the Pushkin Theater, but on the stage of a theater that was friendly to me - in the "Snuffbox".

Pisarev said that the play was translated into Russian in 2007. It was proposed to put different directors, in particular, Alexander Morfov, Kirill Serebrennikov, but all refused. "At first I wasn't going to stage it either, but now I think I've matured for this play and took the risk of staging it," Pisarev continued.

“I tried not to offend either the feelings of the audience, or my own, or the feelings of the artists,” the director noted. “I was not interested in the provocativeness of this play. For me, this is a story about the dignity of a person. close. But both there and there one must live with dignity."

According to the director, he is "happy that he directed Kinaston." "I am very glad that Misha Khomyakov, Vitaly Yegorov, Anya Chipovskaya have interesting roles", - he said.

As for Maxim Matveev, he, in the words of the director, "treated the role of Kynaston with rabid fanaticism." “Maxim deliberately lost 20 kilograms, he himself was engaged in makeup, wig, plastic surgery. It seems to me that he is growing into a large, real artist, and handsome and good artist- a rarity," Pisarev said.

Is it easy to play a woman

“In fact, I lost weight for this role not by 20, but by 12 kilograms,” Maxim Matveev entered into a dialogue. And when asked who is easier to play - a man or a woman, he answered that in any case, you need to play yourself.

“In each image, the actor is looking for something of his own, and this does not depend on the gender of the character,” the actor believes. “It’s not about sexuality, but about the idea. The material itself is interesting, it’s interesting to be silent in the performance, to think, to find something new ".

Matveev said that he was on the staff of the Moscow Art Theater named after Chekhov, and in the "Snuffbox" he worked as a guest artist. "The artistic director is the same, Oleg Pavlovich Tabakov," Maxim remarked with a smile.

At the Moscow Art Theater he plays " Ideal husband", in "Karamazovs", "The Last Victim", and in "Snuffbox" he is busy in "The Devil", "Wolves and Sheep", and now also in "Kinaston".

In the cinema, he played about 40 roles, the most recent work is Vronsky in Karen Shakhnazarov's History of Vronsky.

“After Vronsky, it’s hard for me to understand in which film I would be interested in acting, in which story to join. I have the same feeling now in the theater. After such fertile material as Kynaston, it’s hard to understand what manifestations I myself will be interested in later," the actor said.

First responses

"Kinaston" is just beginning its stage life, and the first viewers are willing to share their emotions, - Ekaterina Strizhkova, head of the literary and artistic part of the Oleg Tabakov Theater, told TASS. - Met two young people. They turned out to be father and son. I ask: "How did you get to the play?" And the father replied that his wife and daughter had been the day before, and they advised.

The first audience impressions are already cited in the program of "Kynaston". "The performance was held in one breath. I'm still impressed! Thank you!", appears in one of the responses. The author of another review advises: "Everyone should go! But I warn you, 18+, however, everything is very beautiful and within limits!"

Most of those who have watched "Kinaston" praise the performance. "Super performance! Bravo!" - write the audience. And they applaud, literally and figuratively.

A comedy with disguises is Pisarev's old hobby, but Pisarev, probably, has a travesty in pure form seems tiresome, he wants plots with meaning, "with meaning", with history. The plot of "Kynaston" is also win-win because it is known quite well thanks to Richard Eyre, who thirteen years ago perfectly screened a completely mediocre (of course, if Stoppard, not Ludwig is taken as a standard) play by Hatcher, the film was shown in the Russian-language box office under an ugly altered title " Beauty in English", the main role in it was played by Billy Crudup:

In Pisarev's production, the role of the protagonist, the actor Kynaston, the performer of the female roles of Shakespeare's repertoire in the era of the Restoration (2nd half of the 17th century), who, with his defiant behavior, provoked the royal wrath and paid with well-being, went to Maxim Matveev, who, in fact, the entire performance on himself and pulls out. True, I watched the cast with Pyotr Rykov as Buckingham, a homosexual aristocrat, Kinaston's lover - Rykov deserves mention only insofar as Kirill Rubtsov from the Vakhtangov Theater was invited to the first cast for Buckingham, I suppose, more vivid and organic in this image. All the rest - from King Charles II (Vitaly Egorov) to comedians - are rude and one-dimensional here. Scenography by Zinovy ​​Margolin effectively masters the technical possibilities of the stage, but does not set a meaningful spatial image.

Theatricality and psychologism, ideally fused in Eyre's film, are presented separately by Pisarev, as if fragments of Primadonnas alternated with scenes from The House That Swift Built (although I don’t even know which of the two options makes me sicker and separately) : comic episodes solved at the level of travesty shows, dramatic ones are played with provincial anguish. However, Matveev, with his plastic abilities and precision of intonation, still somehow manages to pass from travesty in this primitive structure (the apotheosis of which is the interstitial number in the second act: after the royal decree forbidding men to play women on stage and severe beating Kinaston performs in taverns with vulgar verses about a man without eggs for the amusement of a drunken trash) to real drama. He is partly supported in joint scenes by Zhenya Borzykh and Anya Chipovskaya (the first plays a woman who is drawn to the hero as a man, which is difficult for him to reciprocate; the second is an actress, for whom Kinaston is primarily a model and mentor). But one way or another, what surprised and delighted Eyre in the film, in the performance, for the most part, causes boredom, bewilderment, and even disgust.

Well, that is, it causes me, but people are delighted, another box office hit from Pisarev seems to be ready for use - although tickets for pre-premiere shows for 4-5 thousand until the last remained on free sale, but there were overruns on the runs, a competition for several people in place! Or is it just me every time so lucky? It seems that Pizdenysh, and Dimon, and Red-haired Lyuda, and Khorovik sat down normally without a ticket, but as soon as I come to the Snuffbox, it turns out that the places are "double": they send the administrator, double-check the invitations, they are passionately interested in who invited, to what surname ... - it means that they recognize and accept with honor, specify just in case, in order to avoid such overlays in the future! Well, I also help the theater as much as I can - now I constantly photograph invitations, record conversations with the administrator - you never know for what reason it will come in handy to use it ... It’s strange, though, it turns out: even when double places are technically impossible, as in this case - there was an invitation issued by the administrator, but a free ticket on the form strict accountability with an individual barcode - all the same, special attention from the administration falls to my lot. In fact, as they say, "to describe in a play, and then play on stage ..." - what kind of comedy could come out of the intra-theatrical life-being not of English ... of the twelfth century, but of our happy days! But a song about a man without eggs in it would also come in handy.

"The most beautiful woman theater stage» in mid-17th century England, an actor was called Edward Kynaston. According to the laws of that time, all female roles in theatrical performances only men could play. Kynaston in this capacity no one could surpass - he was real star by the standards of any time: handsome, incredibly talented, besides, he was notorious, wore women's dress and, according to rumor, was the lover of the Duke of Buckingham. Here's the role I'm not afraid to take on Maxim Matveev, and I must admit, brilliantly coped with it in the play "Kinaston" V "Snuffbox".

According to the director of "Kinaston" Evgenia Pisareva, Maxim Matveev reacted to the role "with fanaticism", he himself was engaged in makeup, wig, plastic surgery and specially lost 12 kilograms - so in an unexpected way the intrigue with the sudden thinness of the artist that struck many was resolved. This "sacrifice" was not in vain: Matveev's first appearance on stage is impressive. The audience enters English theater the Restoration era, for a performance "Othello" based on a play by Shakespeare. Matveev in the image of Desdemona in a white wig and a long blue dress is graceful, beautiful, feminine in every movement and gesture ... His hero in the play, as in life, will have to go through a difficult path - from universal adoration to falling and almost oblivion, from deliberate femininity to true courage. He will be able to overcome all the hardships of fate and emerge victorious in the end.

The play based on which the play was staged was written in 2003 by the popular American playwright Geoffrey Hatcher, originally called "Perfect female stage beauty". The playwright took as a basis a turning point in the life of both Kynaston himself and England as a whole. In 1660, King Charles II issued a decree according to which all female roles in the theater were to be performed only by women, and no one needed Kynaston. It turns out that it was then, in the middle of the 17th century, with the arrival of women in the theater that real intrigues also came there. However, both the play itself and the performance as read by Yevgeny Pisarev in more is the story of a man who is trying to define who he is. Kynaston is an actor, a man whose trade is to portray women in public. When he is forbidden to continue his career, his professional identity is called into question. In addition, he is clearly bisexual, and it is also important for him to define who he is in a sexual sense.

The play was immediately staged on Broadway, where it was a success. In 2006 film director Richard Eyre made a movie on it "Beauty in English", which, however, did not gain fame as a Broadway production. In Russia, the first translation of the play was made in 2007, it was offered to be staged by various directors, including Kirill Serebrennikov, but everyone refused. Yes, and Evgeny Pisarev did not decide on this production right away. " I was not sure of anything - not in the play, not in myself- admitted the director. - That's why I decided to make a performance not on my territory.(Evgeny Pisarev - artistic director Theatre. Pushkin - THR), but on the stage of a theater friendly to me.I tried not to offend either the feelings of the audience, or my own, or the feelings of the artists. For me, this is a story about human dignity.”.

As a result, "Snuffbox" received a performance that initially promises to be the hit of the season. Director Evgeny Pisarev, set designer Zinovy ​​Margolin and costume designer Maria Danilova managed to create on the stage the alluring and mysterious spirit of the theater . And the genre of "theater in the theater" is loved by the audience at all times. The performance turned out to be spectacular, provocative, with the maximum use of technical capabilities. new site"Snuffboxes" - scenes on Sukharevskaya, where you can instantly change the scenery. The audience is not given the slightest chance to get bored on the scenes with “talks”, while they literally “in the blink of an eye” move to another world, and the drama is replaced by real buffoonery. Well, some frivolity, the opportunity to see the half-naked Maxim Matveev "live", and not on the screen, adds spice to the production.

It is impossible not to note the more than successful selection of artists for the main roles. Appearance in the play Ani Chipovskaya, who played the role of the first actress of the English stage, Margaret Hughes, will attract more than a dozen of her fans to the theater. However, in Kinaston, in addition to her and Maxim Matveev, they also flashed Anastasia Timushkova as the king's mistress Nell Gwynn, and Vitaly Egorov in a deliberately parodic image of Charles II himself.

How I love the Snuffbox. This theater is one of the "five" of my favorites, which also include the theater. Vakhtangov, workshop of P. Fomenko, STI, theater in the South-West. I am ready to visit these theaters every day, however, the income of a pensioner does not allow this.

On Friday we went to the performance of "Kinaston" in the new building of the Snuffbox on Sukharevka.

Tickets, as usual, bought on the Internet. I always regret that not all theaters provide this service.
In the new building of the Snuffbox on Sukharevka (Malaya Sukharevskaya Square, building 5) we were for the first time.
Everyone who loved the basement at Chaplygin Street remembers that it was cramped and stuffy there. In the hall it was possible to see well the play of the actors only in the first three rows.

And here we are in the new "Snuffbox": a large new building located in the building of the business center, a bright lobby, spacious auditorium, the rows are arranged with a rise, so the view of the scene does not suffer.

All employees in nice uniforms gray color(to match the color of the theater itself), smart young people in the wardrobe, everything is stylish and very modern.

If there's anything to complain about, it's the buffet. Frustrates the lack of guilt. Only juices, waters and dubious pastries.

It would be necessary to make a buffet for the new Snuffbox, as in the old one.
In general, we did not stand for a cup of coffee.

Now about the performance itself.

Edward Kynaston is an English actor of the 17th century, known for playing female roles, because in those days women were forbidden to play in the theater.
An accidental quarrel with Charles II's young mistress, Nell Gwyn, leads the king to issue a Decree forbidding men to play female roles.
As a result main character loses his job. Play male roles he can't, that's what he says about it.
- I studied for 14 years until I killed all the male movements and intonations in myself!
Do women play women? But what is the game then?

Edward was brilliantly played by Maxim Matveev. I didn't even know he was that talented. Do you remember Lenin's phrase: "You must firmly remember that of all the arts, cinema is the most important for us"?
I never thought so. Only a theater where it is impossible to make duplicates, where the actor is one on one with us, the audience.

I never take pictures during the performance, I had to look for a photo of Maxim on the Internet.
He looks haggard.

It remains to be seen whether he lost weight for this role or has always been like that. Tolya mockingly said that Liza Boyarskaya did not feed him.
True, I found information that Maxim needed to lose weight to play the main role in the play "Kinaston".
But he will have to play in other performances, and in the cinema. What will he do? According to it, you can already study the anatomy of the human body.

However, the magnificent game of Maxim overshadowed his emaciated appearance.

Another one the main role given to Anna Chipovskaya.
She plays Kynaston's rival, Margaret Hughes. It is she who will be entrusted to play all the female roles that he played.
The finale, where Kynaston plays Othello and Margaret Hughes plays Desdemona, is one of the strongest scenes.

Anna is great on stage. Bravo to her!

Director Yevgeny Pisarev staged a wonderful performance.
Among those who pleased along with the main characters, our old love with my daughter is Vitaly Egorov. The best "Idiot" I have not seen in the theater. It is a pity that the performance was withdrawn from the repertoire. Apparently, a new performer with the same intensity of passions, with the same plastique, was not found in the theater. And Yegorov had already passed the age of Prince Myshkin.

In this production, he played the king.

To the left of Anna Chipovskaya is Mikhail Khomyakov, also dearly beloved by me. My nephew Roma was in the same class as his daughter, and sometimes we got tickets for performances with his participation.
I saw him in the role of Boris Kurochkin in “Overstocked Barrel”, “Enough Simplicity for Every Wise Man” (Mamaev), “At the Bottom” (Bubnov), “Idiot” (Totsky), “Running” (White Commander-in-Chief), “Two Angels , four people ”(Someone Strontsillov). I love the last show.

In this performance, he plays the owner of the theater in which Kynaston serves - Thomas Betterton.

And it is impossible not to mention the mistress of the king - Nell Gwyn performed by Anastasia Timushkova.
He plays superbly, before that I had not seen in the troupe of this theater.

In general, go and see. Spare no money. The performance is worth it.