The first night of "Il barbiere di Siviglia" in "Helikon-Opera" was successful

03.07.2007

The premiere of "Il barbiere di Siviglia" was successful

Yesterday in "Helikon-Opera" was a festive day. The long-awaited premiere of "Il barbiere di Siviglia" took place in our theatre. "Never before the theatre had worked for so long on the production of the performance" - admitted Dmitry Bertman at the press-conference. – Comic opera is a complicated genre, it requires careful actor's study of each scene. For a month and a half the whole syndicate of directors had been working under the production, Natalia Dychenko and Yuri Ustiugov helped me. All artists involved in "Il barbiere di Siviglia" (4-5 casts), were rehearsing on stage from 12.00 am till 00.00 am. It was a really huge work".

But spectators and the journalists who came to see the first night noticed no pressure. The fun, young enthusiasm and violence of paints and emotions reigned on stage, which was surprisingly changed by set and costume designers Tatiana Tulubieva and Igor Nezhny and lighting designer Damir Ismagilov.

Andrey Vylegzhanin, who acted as Figaro, set the tone. He skillfully entered an image of devilly dexterous and artful moneymaker, a showman by vocation, who always plays for the gallery and has the interest in money only. This is how absolutely atypical Dmitry Bertman and Andrey Vylegzhanin see Figaro. Figaro's energy literally covered the hall, it was his day yesterday. And the day had a fantastic final: Dmitry Bertman went on stage after the performance and read the Decree of the President of Russian Federation about assigment of a rank of "The Honoured Artist of Russia" to Andrey Vylegzhanin. What Andrey has to do? He answered with the part of Figaro, sang an encore. The hall burst with the storm of applause.

Karina Grigoryan, the performer of Rosina, acted very vigorously too. Her Rosina was as tender and captivative, as obstinate and persistent. Dmitry Skorikov as Bartolo demonstrated an excellent comic gift: he found a funny walking manner for his character and his tongue-twister  in one of the arias reminded a circus trick. The bright images were created by Vasily Efimov (Almaviva), Mikhail Guzhov (Basilio), Marina Karpechenko (Berta), Alexey Dedov (Fiorello and Officer), Mikhail Laverov (Ambrogio). Our great chorus worked splendidly as usual, creating an atmosphere of a real commedia dell'arte.

The best words that mirrored yesterday's atmosphere were Valery Kichin's (Rossiyskaya Gazeta): "I have never seen so much happiness both on stage and in the hall".

Figaro - Honoured Artist of Russia Andrey Vylegzhanin, artists of the choir
Rosina - Karina Grigoryan, Don Bartolo - Dmitry Skorikov	Berta - Honoured Artist of Russia Marina Karpechenko, Il Conte Almaviva - Vasily Efimov, Don Bartolo - Dmitry Skorikov, Rosina - Karina Grigoryan, Don Basilio - Mikhail Guzhov, Figaro - Honoured Artist of Russia Andrey Vylegzhanin
Ambrogio - Mikhail Laverov,  Don Bartolo - Dmitry Skorikov, Berta - Honoured Artist of Russia Marina Karpechenko	Rosina - Karina Grigoryan
Fiorello - Alexey Dedov, Il Conte Almaviva - Vasily Efimov, artists of the chorus
Rosina - Karina Grigoryan, Il Conte Almaviva - Vasily Efimov,  Figaro - Honoured Artist of Russia Andrey Vylegzhanin, Don Basilio - Mikhail Guzhov	Bows
Press-conference after the performance

Photos by Oleg Nachinkin