As much as Vladimir Pankov’s unique theatrical visions intrigue me, they also can vex me. I often slip into dialogue with him as I watch his productions unfold. One thing irritates. Another surely could have been done differently. Why so much excess? Of sound? Of action? Of people on stage?
And then I stop and think: “Who cares about my nits and picks? Where else am I going to see what I am seeing right now, this whirling, symphonic maelstrom of theater? Nowhere. Only at a Vladimir Pankov show.”
And so it went again as I watched Pankov?€™s ambitious, inventive and boldly imperfect production of Shakespeare?€™s ?€?Romeo and Juliet?€? for the Theater of Nations.
Pankov?€™s biggest decision in staging ?€?Romeo and Juliet?€? was to separate the Montagues and Capulets into different ethnic clans. It?€™s not just any old racial split.
His Montagues are a pale-complected family with European roots. The Capulets are an Asian mix, their skin-color and facial features instantly differentiating them from their Veronese rivals.
Color-blind casting this is not.
But there was more. The Capulets, when moving from one place to another, drag around after them those cheap polyethylene bags that immigrants and homeless people often have in tow around Moscow.
I could not help but bristle. Why such an obvious, unsubtle take on the topic of social inequity? The stereotype is too easy. Art does not want easy choices.
But this show is big, and it cannot be pigeon-holed by a few individual elements. As the action progressed, I increasingly fell under its spell, at times because of its sheer power, at times because of the superb performances.
As Juliet, Seseg Khapsasova brings new qualities to the notion of ?€?headstrong.?€? This Juliet certainly knows who she is and what she wants. No parents, no society, no rules will get in her way of acting as she sees fit. Romeo, in fact, at times seems little more than a tool for this feisty, funny girl to employ to her own ends.
Pavel Akimkin brings a marvelous combination of subtlety, wonder, vulnerability and chutzpah to his interpretation of the doomed Romeo. If at times one wonders how deeply these two youths actually love each other, there is no doubt that they are swept up in a wave of youthful discovery and rebellion that puts them side by side at the moment of reckoning.
This is a beautiful and unorthodox acting duet, and Pankov helped it come to life by providing unusual and effective surroundings for it.
All of this is served up in a dance and musical extravaganza — choreographed by Sergei Zemlyansky ?€” that owes as much to Hollywood?€™s ?€?West Side Story?€? as to the Globe Theater. All original music is composed by the SounDrama Studio, although musical directors Sergei Rodyukov and Alexander Gusev work Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Bellini into the soundscape as well. Maksim Obrezkov designed the space, an elevated square platform surrounded on all sides by spectators.
The chest-bumping, loudmouthing, chain-swinging street confrontations between the hotheads of both clans are athletic and musical at once. But it is the myriad of unexpected details taking us far from Shakespeare that frames this piece as if it were a new painting. By having a woman play Romeo?€™s cohort Benvolio (Anastasia Sychyova), Pankov is able to toss in much entertaining sexual innuendo. A scene of the Montague punks heading out dressed in drag is preceded by a funny instance of the boys stripping hair off Romeo?€™s chest with tape.
Pankov also sets up a moving parallel plot by hinting loudly that Romeo?€™s father (Dmitry Zhuravlyov) once was in love with Juliet?€™s mother (Lilia Soltanova), but lacked the nerve to buck the taboo against their liaison.
Many of the play?€™s key moments ?€” murder and love at first sight, among them ?€” are played out in vignettes before they actually happen, thus lending a sense of cyclicality to this timeless story.
The performance is in a stew of languages, Boris Pasternak?€™s creative Russian translation being just one. Also often employed is the Bard?€™s own English, although it must be said that heavy accents frequently made it Greek to me.
More effective was the melange of other languages ?€” among them Buryat, Uzbek and Azeri. This was a funny and natural way to express the difficulty people have understanding one another.
And that, every bit as much as star-crossed love, is what this production is about.
?€?Romeo and Juliet,?€? a production by the Theater of Nations, plays Fri., Sat., Feb. 16, 17, March 5 and 6 at 8 p.m. at the Meyerhold Center, located at 23 Novoslobodskaya Ulitsa. Metro Mendeleyevskaya. Tel. 629-3739. www.theatreofnations.ru. Running time: 3 hours, 40 minutes.
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