BAMbill APR 2010 2010 Spring Season Robin Williams, Pocahontas, 2009 BAM 2010 Spring Season sponsor: 2010 Spring Season Brooklyn Academy of Music Alan H. Fishman, Chairman of the Board William I. Campbell, Vice Chairman of the Board Adam E. Max, Vice Chairman of the Board Karen Brooks Hopkins, President Joseph V. Melillo, Executive Producer Presents Uncle Vanya Approximate By Anton Chekhov running time: three hours and BAM Harvey Theater ten minutes, Apr 7—10, 2010 at 7:30pm; Apr 11 at 3pm including one intermission Maly Drama Theatre of St. Petersburg—Theatre of Europe, St. Petersburg, Russia Directed by Lev Dodin Set design by David Borovsky Lighting by Igor Tupikin, Ekaterina Dorofeeva Sound by Yury Vavilov Props by Svetlana Tretiakova Wardrobe Maria Fomina, Natalia Selezneva Stage manager Olga Dazidenko In Russian with English titles Premiere—St. Petersburg, April 29, 2003 BAM 2010 Spring Season is sponsored by Bloomberg. Support for Uncle Vanya provided by the Open Society Institute and the Trust for Mutual Understanding. Major support for BAM Theater is provided by The Fan Fox & Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Inc., The Shubert Foundation, Inc., The SHS Foundation, and The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, with additional support from the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust, Rose M. Badgeley Residuary Charitable Trust, and Gary Lynch & Kate Hall. Uncle Vanya Scenes from village life in four acts. Action takes place in Serebriakov’s country house. CAST Professor Serebriakov Igor Ivanov Elena, his wife Ksenya Rappoport Sonia, his daughter from his first marriage Elena Kalinina Madame Voinitskaia, Professor’s first wife’s mother Tatyana Schuko Voinitskiy Ivan (Uncle Vanya), her son Sergey Kuryshev Doctor Astrov Igor Chernevich Telegin Ilia (Waffles), impoverished gentry Alexander Zavyalov Marina, old nurse Vera Bykova Servant Alexander Koshkarev ADDITIONAL CREDITS Technical director Evgeny Nikiforov Set construction by Nikolai Murmanov Prop construction Lubov Betechtina Make-up by Alla Nudel MALY DRAMA THEATRE Sponsor General of the Theater—KINEF Partner General of the Theater—Mikhail Prokhorov Foundation Artistic Director of the Maly Drama Theatre—Theatre of Europe Lev Dodin Thanks to barbicanbite, London for titles The 2010 US tour of Uncle Vanya is supported by the Ministry for Culture of Russian Federation AWARDS Golden Mask Award for Best Director—2004 Golden Mask Award for Best Actor—2004 Italian Critics Prize for Best Foreign Production—2004 LEV DODIN on UNCLE VANYA Life flows by, and sooner or later a man begins to see his years lived as a treasure he didn’t manage to put to good use. He starts to see visions of other possible but unlived lives. In these other lives all his secret dreams come true, all his hopes are fulfilled, all his sweetest fantasies become real. The man furiously burns up the past, denies the present, and gives himself completely to this other life which he could have lived, but didn’t manage to. The fuller the man understands life, the sharper he feels this gap, this contradiction which grows into a tragedy. Time goes by, and gradually you are faced with a choice—to either refuse this life completely, or to find courage to live out the life given to you by God and fate, which you’ve been carrying out—alone—with your will power and personality. Fatally ill doctor Chekhov knew this paradox only too well, and he analyzed it with amazing tenderness and desperate ruthlessness. This, among many other things, define Chekhov’s plays, and the most beautiful of them—Uncle Vanya—carries a simple but eternal melody and themes. Who’s Who LEV DODIN (director) was born in 1944 in Izmailova at the Taras Shevchenko Theatre of Siberia, where his mother was evacuated during Opera and Ballet, then worked with director the war. As a youth, he studied theater at the Leonid Varpakhovsky at MkhAT and the Maly Leningrad Young Viewers’ Theatre. After high Theatre. He began working with Yury Lyubi- school graduation, he attended Leningrad The- mov at the Taganka Theatre in Moscow in the atre Institute, studying with Boris Zon, a student 1960s. Borovsky collaborated on some of this of Stanislavsky. Dodin’s directorial debut was theater’s most famous productions, such as in 1966 with a telecast of First Love based on Alive (the play was staged in 1968 but was the story by Ivan Turgenev, followed by dozens banned and only shown to the public in 1989); of shows at theaters in St. Petersburg, Moscow, Mother; Hamlet; The House on the Embank- and internationally. They included It’s a Family ment; The Intersection; Crime and Punishment; Affair—We’ll Settle It Ourselves, Rosa Berndt, Master and Margarita; The Dawns are Quiet The Mirror, The Golovlev Family, A Gentle Here; Vladimir Vysotsky; Believe, Comrade; and Creature, and Bankrupt. Opera productions others. Borovsky often worked abroad. He cre- he directed include Elektra for the Salzburg ated sets for Lyubimov’s productions in Italy and Festival, Mazeppa at Milan’s La Scala, Lady the UK. In Hungary he worked with Istvan Hor- Macbeth of the Mtsensk District for Florence’s vai, in West Germany with Oleg Tabakov, and May Festival, The Demon at Paris’ Châtelet, and in Finland with Kama Ginkas. Years of close The Queen of Spades (Amsterdam, Florence, collaboration and friendship with Lev Dodin Paris). The first work he directied for the Maly brought such plays as Lord of the Flies, Molly Drama Theatre was Karel Capek’s The Robber Sweeney, Uncle Vanya, and his last oeuvre, in 1974, then Abramov’s The House in 1980. King Lear (2006) at the Maly Drama Theatre. Since becoming Maly’s artistic director in 1983, Operas include Elektra (Salzburg Festival), his works include Brothers and Sisters, Lord of Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District (Flor- the Flies, Gaudeaumaus, The Possessed, Stars ence Musical May Festival), Queen of Spades in the Morning Sky, Desire Under the Elms, (Amsterdam, Florence, Paris), Mazeppa (La The Cherry Orchard, Chevengur, Claustropho- Scala, Milan), Demon (Châtelet), and Salome bia, King Lear, A Play with No Name, Uncle (Opera Bastille, Paris). Borovsky participated in Vanya, Life and Fate, Love’s Labour’s Lost, many international exhibits. He was awarded and Long Day’s Journey into Night. In 1967, numerous Russian and international awards, in- Dodin began to teach acting and directing. He cluding the Russian State Prize and the Triumph is a professor at the St. Petersburg Academy independent prize. He received gold medals of Theatrical Arts and chair of the Directing from the Russian Arts Academy, the Prague Department. He has taught several generations Quadrenialle, the Yugoslav Trienialle, and is a of actors and directors; many are currently as- People’s Artist of Russia. On the dramatic and sociated with the Maly Drama Theatre. Dodin’s opera stages of Russia, Italy, Germany, Hun- productions have garnered international laurels, gary, France, Finland, and the US, Borovsky including the state prizes of Russia and the created more than 150 productions. USSR, the Triumph Independent Prize, Golden Mask National Awards, and a Lawrence Olivier VERA BYKOVA (Marina, old nurse) was born in Award. He received the European Theatre Sverdlovsk and graduated from the Sverdlovsk Award (2000) and the Russian Presidential State Theatre School in 1968. She worked Award (2001). several years in Barnaul and Tomsk, and was invited to join the Maly Drama Theatre in 1972. DAVID BOROVSKY (set designer, 1934— She is an Honored Artist of Russia (1985) and 2006) began working as an artist in Kiev with winner of the USSR State Prize (1986 for the the Lesya Ukrainka Russian Drama Theatre. role of Yevdokiya the Martyr in The House). He created sets for Shostakovich’s Katerina She plays Pelageya Lobanova in Brothers and Who’s Who Photo: Viktor Vassilliev Viktor Photo: Sisters, the Landowner’s Wife in Mumu, Paulina acted with the Tomsk Young Viewers’ Theatre from in The Winter’s Tale, Marina (Old Nurse) in Uncle 1979—1980; the same year he became an actor Vanya, and Neta in The Moscow Choir by Ludmila with the Maly Drama Theatre. He was People’s Petrushevskaya. Bykova has appeared in the films Artist of Russia (2004). Roles include Yegor in Opposition, To Cross the Line, Chance Waltz, The House, Petr Zhitov in Brothers and Sisters, Place Under the Sun, and Evening Lights. Lopakhin in The Cherry Orchard, Lebyadkin in The Posessed, Glagolev in A Play with No Name/ IGOR CHERNEVICH (Doctor Astrov) was born in Platonov, Barukh Naileben in The Disappearance, 1966 in Orsha (Belarus), and graduated in 1989 King of France in King Lear, Mostovskoy in Life from the Leningrad Institute of Theatre, Music and and Fate, James Tyrone in Long Day’s Journey Cinema (Lev Dodin’s class). He joined the troupe into Night. of the Maly Drama Theatre the same year. He has played Bogdanov in Gaudeamus, the Musician in ELENA KALININA (Sonia) graduated from the St. Claustrophobia, Erkel in The Devils, Yasha and the Petersburg Academy of Theatrical Arts in 2000 (V. Student at the Ball in The Cherry Orchard, Osip in Filshtinsky’s class). She joined the company of the A Play Without a Title, Ignat Baev in Brothers and Maly Drama Theatre in the same year. Kalinina Sisters, Piyusya in Chevengur, Jean in Miss Julie, plays Galya in The Moscow Choir by Ludmila Duke of Cornwall in King Lear, Barchatov and Petrushevskaya, Sonia in Uncle Vanya, Grekova Kovchenko in Life and Fate, and appeared in the in A Play with No Name/Platonov, Regan in King play Morphine at the Théâtre Bobigny (Paris). He Lear, Dasha in The Possessed. has appeared in the filmsThe Ring, Nicotine, The Spirit, Dolce Vita (Hungary), Knock-Out (Sweden). ALEXANDER KOSHKAREV (Servant) was born in 1964 in Leningrad and graduated from the Lenin- IGOR IVANOV (Professor Serebriakov) graduated grad Theatre, Music and Cinema Institute in 1989 from the Leningrad State Theatre, Music and (Lev Dodin’s class), after which he was immedi- Cinema Institute (Katsman and Dodin’s class).