The Kharkiv theatre “Beautiful Flowers” is only five years old. It first performed on Kyiv stage during the GogolFest and immediately won the sophisticated audiences of this creative festival. Meanwhile, the Ukraine-wide Dracula Tour, organized by a newly-formed agency, PRO Production Ukraine, headed by the producer and director Serhii Proskurnia, started the other day with the stage production Dracula that drew thunderous applause in a packed house. Proskurnia is well known not only for his numerous mega projects, including the once immensely popular theatrical festivals “Berezillia” and “Art Grandees,” but also for his deep affection for the roots of Ukrainian culture and theater and the desire to develop and popularize the latter.
The production Dracula captivates you from the very first minute not so much with its narrative and informative component as with high professionalism of the actors who possess their bodies in a virtuosic way and skillfully create a ringing emotion by the language of plastique. The level of the played images is so high and stable that it is difficult to single somebody out of this superb ensemble of actors. Artem Vusyk, who plays the role of a mad patient and is at the same time the stage director of this extravaganza, is full of ideas which his stage partners – Serhii Babkin (Dracula), Ihor Kliuchnik (Jonathan Harker), Snizhana Babkina (Mina), Oksana Cherkashyna (Lucy), and Denys Chmeliov (doctor Van Helsing) – willingly implement.
The whole production is essentially a filigree chain of plastic studies, so familiar to any theatrical college student. Plastique has been an indispensable instrument in the history of theater – from Ancient Greek choruses, through commedia dell’arte, to the Vakhtangov Theater’s famous Zani scenes which so much enriched the “veteran” Princess Turandot. The “Beautiful Flowers” theater’s concept is an ode to plastique, when no words are spoken. It works, bringing the audience’s emotions to the limit.
Despite a lack of funds, the producers still managed to think out the scenography to the minutest details and make it organic. This is an undeniable merit of the production designer Olha Taruta-Prasolova. Also noteworthy is the riot of light created by Volodymyr Minakov.
In my view, the Kyiv start of the Ukraine-wide tour is more than successful. Theatrical discoveries are now in store for audiences in Kremenchuk, Kirovohrad, Cherkasy, and 33 more cities. I am sure theatergoers in these cities will not complain about lost time.
