As we have written, a new, major premiere is in the works — Pinocchio — the latest project from Boris Yukhananov which spectators will see in the summer of 2019. For now, please meet the creative team.

Boris Yukhananov:

Pinocchio is a very important production for me, primarily because I will be presenting a new, unknown playwright, a unique individual, Andrei Vishnevsky. I consider him the first genuinely new processual playwright. He creates worlds and texts that grow and develop. This is the essence of what I consider to be his remarkable drama. His work is completely unexpected and very much unlike other contemporary texts. At the same time, I am making no tolerant gestures in regards to the play; I am creating a true version of theatre. Andrei is present at almost all of the rehearsals.
I am creating this production in tandem with Yuri Kharikov. Ours is a genuine dialogue that is both beautifully and complex. Also working with me are my usual team of costume designer Anastasia Nefyodova, composer Dmitri Kourliandski, and choreographer Andrei Kuznetsov-Vecheslov.
Work on Pinocchio has been going on for a long time. We have considered a large variety of different set designs. Yuri Kharikov actually created a whole book of options.
This will be a big, significant project for the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre. It will engage almost the entire company. The role of Pinocchio will be played by two wonderful young actresses: Svetlana Naidyonova and Maria Belyaeva.
Pinocchio is a performance that has features of a meta-opera. I would call the work a mystery play. In a sense, Pinocchio continues the fairytale line that is so important for the Electrotheatre, and which we originally launched with The Blue Bird.
A preview of the production is scheduled to take place in July 2019, while the full, two-part piece, Pinocchio. Forest and Pinocchio. Theatre, will transpire in October 2019.

Boris Yukhananov and Andrei Vishnevsky. Photo by Olympia Orlova

Boris Yukhananov and Yuri Kharikov. Photo by Olympia Orlova

Boris Yukhananov and Anastasia Nefedova. Photo by Olympia Orlova

Boris Yukhananov and Dmitri Kourliandski. Photo by Olympia Orlova

Boris Yukhananov and Andrei Kuznetsov-Vecheslov. Photo by Olympia Orlova

Set Models

Pinocchio is a 21st century puppet, not a wooden product carved by a carpenter. He is born of the World Tree via Cesarean section performed by a surgeon named Geppetto.
LABOR
The surgeon Geppetto and his assistant Cherry deliver Pinocchio from the Tree. The Tree gives birth to a small, humanlike being.

HUNGER
Pinocchio is alone in the laboratory in search of food. He finds an egg, but no omelette satisfies his hunger, for the egg contains chicks which fly away when they receive their freedom.

CLOTHING
Geppetto takes Pinocchio to the Magic Forest, where the Forest itself dresses Pinocchio in a thin robe made of forest material.

Pinocchio has a vision after witnessing several episodes of Harlequin serving various masters (a gangster nicknamed Meat, the dancer Mata Hari, the twins Holy and Witch, the Sun King, and Tita-nia the Fairy Queen), and the suicide of Pierrot.

Pinocchio has a vision after witnessing several episodes of Harlequin serving various masters (a gangster nicknamed Meat, the dancer Mata Hari, the twins Holy and Witch, the Sun King, and Tita-nia the Fairy Queen), and the suicide of Pierrot.

Pinocchio has a vision after witnessing several episodes of Harlequin serving various masters (a gangster nicknamed Meat, the dancer Mata Hari, the twins Holy and Witch, the Sun King, and Tita-nia the Fairy Queen), and the suicide of Pierrot.

THE THEATRE LOBBY. JUNKIE-PINOCCHIO

A tour begins in the theatre lobby, which is occupied by junkie-pagliacci. Junkies are not allowed to go beyond this place into the theatre. Junkie-pagliacci (junkie-clowns or just junkies) are former theatre actors who were expelled, and who now experience painful withdrawals without theatre. In order to ease the pain somehow, they inject themselves with “theatre substance.”