Pagliacci
PHOTOALBUM
PAGLIACCI
R. Leoncavallo
Musical Director and Conductor: Evgeny Brazhnik
Decorations: Alexander Arefiev
Costumes: Maria Chernyshova
Lighting designer: Damir Ismagilov
Choreographer: Ksenia Lisanskaya
Choirmaster: Evgeny Ilyin
Playing Time - 2 hours with an interval
Sometimes life itself generates such tangled stories that a composer does not have to make anything else up. An actor of a travelling troupe stabs his wife and her lover with a knife. The accident happens in the house where the future great composer Ruggero Leoncavallo is growing up. Years later the tragic story became the subject of a bestseller opera "Pagliacci", a performance where spectators from all over the world have shed sincere tears for over a hundred years!
For “Helikon-Opera’’ ‘Pagliacci’ is a significant opera. It used to be staged in the open air courtyard of Princess Shakhovskaya mansion where now is Stravinsky Hall. Young and fearless artistes would drive into the yard in an orange "Zaporozhets" and "played" the opera with a true passion. This was the start of a great success of "Helikon-Opera".
The current production by Dmitry Belyanushkin, the winner of the first NANO-Opera contest, is the third one in the history of “Helikon-opera”.
The young director has dedicated this play to theatre and those people who work and live for it. It makes clear that between real life and its on-stage interpretation lies a fine line. It also shows what a ruthless profession is being an actor. Putting forward the idea of "a show within a show", Director moves the action from an Italian village to a theatre backstage.
Insulted and suffering Canio, devilishly handsome Silvio, gentle Nedda, rough Tonio, funny Beppo – every image created by actors sinks into the mind. Life as it is, unvarnished.