The play "Amsterdam": reviews, actors and interesting facts

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

In January 2017, the performance "Amsterdam" was performed at the Sovremennik Theater based on Alexander Galin's play "Parade". This is an ironic comedy about homophobia in Russia that makes you think seriously about tolerance. The play deals with the problem of fathers and children. This topic is not new in art and in life, more and more often such issues are raised in society in the context of the confrontation between European and Russian views. Now the problem is most relevant, since many children of we althy parents study abroad, European standards of freedom are not alien to them.

Features of the play

Announced at the end of 2016, the premiere took place after the Christmas holidays. The main role in the production expected by all was offered to Mikhail Efremov. It was this actor, according to the director of the play S. Gazarov, who couldconvey the entire depth of the protagonist's drama through a comedic image. Theater critics believe that the play can be attributed to the modern classics in demand in our time.

The director presented to the public a farce-comedy in which he invited the viewer to come to an understanding of true human relations through an ironic clash of two worldviews. If, leaving the hall, the audience thinks about the revealed problems, they are able to accept something new, then the performance was not played in vain. Everyone will look for answers to their questions already outside the theater.

Storyline

The plot, simple in content, captivates the viewer from the very first minute. The scene of what is happening is the capital of tolerance and tolerance, Amsterdam, where Skvortsov Nikolai (Mikhail Efremov) arrives for the weekend to meet his wife and son Victor, who lives, as is customary with the nouveau riche, abroad. Skvortsov is the most typical new Russian Cossack (viewers see him in a Cossack caftan) who knows how to spend money. True, he managed to serve time for some fraud. The domes stuffed on the back make it clear to the viewer how difficult the formation of this hero was, from what environment he rose, becoming now a Ural millionaire deputy who made his fortune in the dashing 90s.

In the performance, the audience sees Nikolai Skvortsov in a fairly drunk. And he came not only to meet with his family, but to relieve stress from the daily changing rules at his work. From him, as from the Urals deputy, they demanded that the family and children be at home, and nottraveled abroad.

But suddenly a problem with his son falls upon him, which is worse than the one from which he flew away from the Urals.

Ties

A family drama unfolds in the play "Amsterdam" at the Sovremennik Theatre. Kolya's wife (actress Alena Babenko), a former actress from a provincial theater, is very fond of a luxurious life abroad, she is quite satisfied that her husband only visits. The main thing is that he ensures her comfortable existence and pays for his son's studies. The family is ideal at first glance, but … Everyone knows the expression "There is a freak in the family" - the role of "freak" in their family is assigned to the son.

They didn't expect and didn't guess that Victor (Shamil Khamatov) would cut the ground from under his father's feet by coming to the hotel room with his friend, who walks in a woman's dress and high heels. But most of all, the father was stunned by the news that his son would participate in the "lumberjacks" parade, as Starlings calls people with a non-traditional orientation, and that his son may be one of them …

Nikolai Skvortsov, having taken a sip on the bottle while still on the plane, continues to drink heavily in the hotel room. Drunk to hell and not understanding the situation, Skvortsov quarrels with his son and kicks his friend Viktor out of the room.

Decoupling

But here the viewer is presented with a scene with a bizarre design and a balcony, from which Skvortsov, drunk to smithereens in shorts and a T-shirt, yells with a slurred tongue to the passing underwindows of the hotel to the gay parade alone he understands the slogans. He tries to explain to those who participate in the parade what it means to love and how, trying to pull his wife out onto the balcony to show the beauty of the traditional orientation. Audience reviews of the play "Amsterdam" with Efremov speak of the organic reincarnation of this wonderful artist, who can be "almost an animal" on stage.

In the second act, Skvortsov is not limited to shouting from the balcony, he is trying to escape from the room to participate in the parade. With a saber in his hands and barely on his feet, Skvortsov ends up at the police station. The finale of the performance has a logical conclusion - everyone was reconciled. Senior Skvortsov is reassured that his son is of the right orientation, and he will soon become a grandfather.

Reviews of the play "Amsterdam"

The authors of the performance position it as a comedy. This is understandable, there is something to laugh at in the performance, but there are also sad scenes … They laughed heartily at the sight of Mikhail Efremov in the image of his hero Nikolai Skvortsov in shorts. The game of Evgeny Pavlov, who embodied on stage the image of Victor's friend - Dolores - is simply amazing. The plasticity and flexibility of the actor are noted. The audience likes the strong performance of the artists, and the cast can be called stellar.

The plot of the production is relevant in our time. This is stated in the reviews of the play "Amsterdam". He is both funny and sad at the same time. The eternal conflict of fathers and children. clashinterests of generations and the struggle for the rightness between these generations. The older generation, people of respectable age, do not tolerate any changes, the traditions of grandparents are sacred to them. Young people strive to change the established world order in accordance with their worldview and fiercely defend their values in this world. The authors of the performance lead the viewer to understand how important it is to be heard and learn to hear others. To the realization that you cannot accept the new while remaining true to your deep-rooted beliefs.

Fathers and Sons

In Russia, you have to be either rich or famous to be addressed the same as in Europe. For Viktor Skvortsov, this is understandable, he lives and studies in London. Most likely, that is why he supports minorities and stands up for the persecuted. He understands how to treat people. That is why he participates in the gay parade, showing his human attitude towards people of a different orientation. But he can't explain it to his parents. He thinks they won't understand him.

Oddly enough, but Skvortsov Sr., having talked for just one day with his son and a circle of young people, the same Russians as his son, but living in Europe, came to the conclusion that to remain human and learn to understand and accept people as they are - that is the main thing that the son wanted to convey to him. By the end of the performance, the hero of Mikhail Efremov understood his son, but his father's son did not.

Perception of the performance as a tragic farce

In reviews of the play "Amsterdam" there are verydeep reflections on the problems posed in the play. An attentive viewer understood the message of the authors - a clash of worldviews - Russian and Western European. With ironic reflection, the unwillingness of a Russian person to accept Western European values, the main of which is the freedom of the individual, is shown. The protagonist delivers an impressive monologue about the needs that dominate the current Russian society - money and power.

Reviews of the play "Amsterdam" at the Sovremennik Theater prove that people do not just come to laugh, but try to separate the seeds from the chaff. Not everyone, but many, are able to discern the meaning put into the play by the author: do not laugh out loud at homophobic jokes and caustic comparisons of the “decaying West” with “correct Russia”. In order for awareness to come, actor Mikhail Efremov plays a drunken Russian, but his monologues make you think.

About the game of artist Mikhail Efremov

Efremov's brilliant game was noted both in the reviews and in the reviews of the play "Amsterdam". When he is on stage, everything around fades. He, as the audience notices, sometimes "squeezes", and sometimes "peeps" out of the role. The ability to play the way he does is called the textbook of the actor's skill. He is able to convey through comedic images the depth of the drama or the tragedy of the hero. The audience notes that the whole performance seems to revolve around its hero, although none of the cast can be blamed for an uninteresting game.