LEV DODIN / MALY TEATR

“It seems to me that this (the theme of the Platonov’s novel) is one of the most universal problems facing us today, that is to say, that the most terrible things are done not out of hate, but out of love, out of the desire to do good…Mankind, wanting to realize the dream of paradise on earth, always ends by creating an inferno for those around and for himself.”

Lev Dodin


Adapted from a novel by Andrei Platonov, this play tells the story of Cevengur, described by director Lev Dodin as a small provincial city that could be anywhere at any time in the world – a city populated at the beginning of the piece by lonely, marginal people who feel themselves lost in the world. Spurred by the suicide by drowning of one of the community members, a small group decides to create a state based on what they call “Communism”, which in the usage of Platonov is a way of saying utopia. However, as the story unfolds, it becomes clear that there is a flaw at the heart of this, as every other, utopia that will lead unavoidable to its destruction.

Performed by the acclaimed actors of the Maly Teatr, this production brings out all the subtle irony and humanity of a novel that has been called the Don Quixote of Russia.

With a company of almost 25 actors and a simple yet monumental setting, a square of earth surrounded by wire walls that can rise up, and in front an iron walkway that can sink into the ground revealing a pit filled with dark water, this production was initially imagined by Mr. Dodin when he visited the monument to the earthquake that destroyed the small provincial city of Gibellina in Sicily in 1968.

PRODUCTION DATES
Weimar, Germany, 1999
Gibellina, Italy, Teatro dei Ruderi
28 – 31 July 1999
Milan, Italy, Piccolo Teatro
18 – 21 December 1999
Rome, Italy, Teatro di Roma
30 July – 2 August 2000