Concrete. Carnal. And not only because it is immersed in a murky story of blood and sex. But why did it really happen? «Taken from a true story» we would read today in the opening credits of a film or TV series. A news story, that of Lady Macbeth of the Mcensk district by Dmitrij Shostakovich. Written in 1932, performed in Leningrad in 1934, the only work by the composer who planned a trilogy on the Russian woman, three female portraits of as many women belonging to different social classes. Libretto by Alexander Prejs from the story of the same name by Nikolaij Leskov from 1865, published in the monthly Epòcha, directed by the brothers Mikhail and Fedor Dostoevsky.
Now, Russian director Vasily Barkhatov, born in 1983, with a past in his home theaters – the Bolsh’oi in Moscow and the Marinsky in St. Petersburg – and a present on the lyrical stage of Europe, decides to go beyond the news. And imagine a Katerina Izmajlova who, despite the turbidity of her actions, in the darkness of her crimes, “resembles each of us who witness her parable, because like each of us she seeks happiness”.
Wrong, of course. This young author knows this by directing A Lady Macbeth of the Mcensk District by Dmitrij Shostakovich which on Sunday inaugurates the new season of the Teatro alla Scala with Riccardo Chailly on the podium, «a director attentive to dramaturgy, not just music» assures Barkhatyov. Which takes her Katerina Izmajlova «from the peasant village of Alexander Prejs’s libretto to the palaces of Russia in the 1950s of socialist classicism».
No squalid cellars for the story of the multiple-homicidal woman, but Stalinist Gothic buildings, those of the so-called “wedding cake” style that appeared in the Soviet Union between 1933 and 1955. “My Katerina lives here,” says the director.
And who is this Katerina Izmajlova for you? A victim or a perpetrator?
First of all he is a person who seeks the path to happiness, to freedom. And to do so, as we know, he makes mistakes. It kills. Both Shostakovich’s Katarina and Nikolaij Leskov’s contain within themselves many people, many psychological nuances and it is difficult to judge them as victims or executioners. Everything cannot be reduced to a single sentence. Her actions are horrible, but Katerina, ever since she appears on stage, struggles to desperately search for her identity: as I tell it on the stage of the Teatro alla Scala, she is a woman looking for her freedom.
Of course the men around her don’t make a good impression: a violent father-in-law, an inept husband, an unfaithful lover.
To photograph the men who populate Katerina’s life, it is interesting to go to the literary source of A Lady Macbeth of the Mcensk District by Nikolaij Leskov which paints its protagonist as a monster, as absolute evil, while Sergej is seen as a victim. An anti-feminist vision that Shostakovich subverts, telling, on the contrary, the tragedy of a woman and painting the men who surround her as animals prey to the lowest instincts.
However, it is necessary to protect ourselves from a possible identification with those who do evil, especially since today the news tells us about too many tragic events. Perhaps this is why you chose to distance the story from us in time?
The setting is not contemporary but dates back to the 1950s, and the story does not take place in the Russian countryside, but in the great palaces of socialist classicism, but the connection with our present is offered by Katerina’s human story, which arouses reflections today as it already happened yesterday, when the novel came out and when the opera was staged.
So for a work to speak to our time, it isn’t always necessary to update it and make it contemporary?
There is no rule, everything starts from what the story must convey to us and inspire in the spectators. Whether in costume or jeans, a work can be boring or beautiful. It doesn’t depend on the years in which it is performed. For me it is important to find the perfect atmosphere, the right time to best tell a story. There can also be relevance in a costume staging, which I really like if long skirts and cloaks are useful for arousing emotions and reflections. Human history is the most effective actualization, it is the clearest example of what must be current, like the stories of the Bible and the parables of the Gospel.
A lady Macbeth from the Mcensk district is her debut at the Teatro alla Scala. And not on just any evening, but on December 7, when the eyes of the musical world are focused on Milan. What effect does it have on her?
It is a mix of feelings and emotions that arouses in me being on stage in one of the most important theaters of all time, where the greatest musicians in history have performed and what’s more on an important date like the Sant’Ambrogio Scaligero. And it is therefore a great responsibility. But I didn’t let myself be influenced, I wanted to be faithful to myself and my style, to my way of seeing direction, as happens in any context in which I find myself working.
There isn’t a Verdi on the bill that everyone loves and knows and who, therefore, could cause some concern. There is Shostakovich’s work that has never been seen on the evening of Sant’Ambrogio. Does this help?
Every title is important and a December 7th with Shostakovich, of course, might seem a little strange. But the composer’s music and the very modern dramaturgy of the text have produced such a masterpiece that will conquer everyone. He’s always done it. And even at La Scala there are editions that have had great success among music lovers.
A title strongly desired by Riccardo Chailly.
We have had the opportunity to discuss a lot over the last two years about the vision of the work. I am happy to work with him because he is absolutely a man of theatre, he is perfectly aware of the dramaturgical aspect of the opera and not just the music. There is listening, research and sharing which has led to mutual support and esteem.
The panning of Pravda and the censorship to which Lady Macbeth from the Mcensk district was subjected shine the spotlight, even today, on the relationship between art and politics.
I think that theater is the highest way of doing politics and no politics can tell art what to do or not do. And art must be put in a position to say what it thinks. Even the censorship that affected this title is more complex than what we know. It is not censorship on the issues, but censorship from a human point of view. Many musicians of the time attempted to tarnish Shostakovich’s name and Stalin was influenced. The relationship between art and politics is always more complex than it appears. Also because it happens that sometimes art and politics can get along. Shostakovich’s own story tells it, with his Seventh Symphony, Leningrad, broadcast over loudspeakers in the city under siege by the German army.
Is being a Russian artist an added value for staging this opera?
There is no monopoly. Many directors have proposed excellent stagings of A Lady Macbeth. Having grown up in Russia helps me to have an in-depth knowledge of my country’s literature and of the cultural background from which Shostakovich and his works come. There are many quotes from Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov, a title that is fundamental for our culture. However, when you are called upon to stage A Lady Macbeth, or any other Russian text, you have no discounts just because you grew up in Moscow.
The first to see his show will be the kids from the Youth Preview. How to involve them?
We need to educate the public about the good and the beautiful. Everyone, all over the world, is doing everything possible to retain the current audience, but above all to make it grow with special programs and trying to speak the language of young people more. Theater must be effective because the messages that arrive from the stage must be understood immediately. This doesn’t mean that you have to propose easy things, but that you have to know how to use the right language. For training, experience counts, but above all how you do it and where you do it. If you see the wrong production at the wrong time, you’ll never return to the theater. We need to encourage the public to understand that not everything is old and boring. We need to sow seeds of beauty and hope. Also with A lady Macbeth from the Mcensk district.
