Status: 10.01.2022 4:18 p.m.
The Russian director Serebrennikov was not allowed to leave his homeland for four years. Now, completely surprisingly, he has received a travel permit – and is staging a play at the Hamburg Thalia Theater.
Surprising turnaround in the case of Kirill Serebrennikow: The Russian star director was allowed to leave Russia and has arrived at the Hamburg Thalia Theater for rehearsals. The theater announced. Behind him are more than four years of strict travel bans and numerous stagings via zoom and video across Europe. Since Monday he has been conducting rehearsals for his production of Chekhov’s story “The Black Monk” at the Thalia Theater.
Serebrennikov was arrested and placed under house arrest in the summer of 2017. The prison camp requested by the public prosecutor’s office for alleged embezzlement of funds was converted into a three-year suspended sentence with a ban on leaving Russia during the trial in summer 2020. Now, very suddenly, he was given permission to work in Hamburg, it was said.
“Very happy and happy”
According to the theater, Serebrennikov said on his arrival at Hamburg Airport on Saturday: “I am very, very happy and happy that Hamburg is the first European city in which I can work again after four and a half years!” Because it is also the last City he was in before. “That feels very good! That is a good sign, and definitely not a coincidence!” Says the director.
Thalia director Joachim Lux said: “I am very pleased to be able to welcome Kirill Serebrennikow to Hamburg. That is an encouragement for the idea of freedom and an encouragement for art too.” He hardly knows any artist who burns and lives for the freedom of art with such great philanthropy, inner independence and uncompromising attitude.
The premiere of “The Black Monk” based on a story by the Russian author Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) is scheduled for January 22nd to mark the opening of the “Lessingtage”. After the premiere, Serebrennikov will return to Moscow for an international film.
Serebrennikov always protested his innocence
There was great solidarity in Germany when the star director was tried in Moscow. Serebrennikov had always protested his innocence and complained about the lack of evidence. Because he often relentlessly shows reality, the opera and theater maker repeatedly makes enemies in Russian society. The verdict was criticized as a severe blow to the liberal art scene in Russia.
Arrest in Russia in 2017, suspended sentence and travel ban – the Russian director Serebrennikov had always protested his innocence and complained about the lack of evidence.
Image: dpa
A good year ago, Serebrennikov was able to stand on stage for the first time after his time under house arrest in the world-famous Bolshoi Theater in Moscow with the final applause. Shortly afterwards he lost his job as the theater manager of the internationally known Gogol Center in the Russian capital.
The Russian newspaper “Kommersant” wrote in November that the theater maker had paid his fine of 129 million rubles (the equivalent of 1.5 million euros).
“Parsifal” staging via zoom
In spring Serebrennikow had staged Richard Wagner’s music drama “Parsifal” at the Vienna State Opera – due to travel restrictions via Zoom. After the world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, his film “Petrov’s Flu” (“Petrov’s Flu”) had its theatrical release in Moscow at the beginning of September. The almost two and a half hour long film is a deliberately grotesquely over-the-top and timeless kaleidoscope of Russian society.