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Chekhov and the Impeiial Theatres
As you go along Nevsky, you glance towards the Haymarket: clouds the colour of smoke, the setting sun a crimson globe - Dante's hell!
Notebook No, 1
New forms of life follow always new forms in literature (the precursors), and that is why they will always be so abhorrent to the conservative human spirit.
Notebook No. 1
In January 1889, a revised version of Chekhov's play Ivanov was given its Petersburg premiere, following its first performance in Moscow just over a year earlier. The Moscow production had taken place at the privately owned theatre run by Fyodor Korsh. In Petersburg, Ivanov was staged at the state-run Alexandrinsky, still at that time the most important drama theatre in Russia. For most of the nineteenth century, the Russian government maintained successful control of theatrical life in Petersburg and Moscow, banning private companies from performing during the main season. In Petersburg, the Alexandrinsky and the M:khailovsky were the state-owned venues for spoken drama. After the state monopoly was lifted in 1882, impresarios were quick off the mark in the more entrepreneurial Moscow, the merchant capital (Korsh opened his theatre the same year), but it took over a decade for private theatres to establish themselves properly in the more staid capital.
The Imperial Alexandrinsky Theatre, St Petersburg, where The Seagi 11 pren ;ered in 1896
In the mean^me, the Alexandrinsky', the elegant classical theatre built by Ross in 1832 and named after the wife of Nicholas I, remained the most important stage in the capital for drama. Since the theatre was government-run, there was no problem with funding: it had plenty of money to hire the best technicians, the best producers and the best
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actors if it so desired (another reason why it took a while before private companies were in a position to compete). But the government's tastes in art were as reactionary as its tastes in politics, so neither the repertoire, nor the manner in which plays were produced offered much in the way of artistic excitement, And like any other government department, the Directorate of the Imperial Theatres was run by bureaucrats, who ensured that the path from the initial submission of a new play to opening night was as complicated as possible. Fortunately for Chekhov, he had Ids friend Suvorin on hand to conduct all the negotiations with the Imperial Theatres on his behalf for the staging оi Ivanov at the Alexandrinsky. Suvorin knew all the right people and was farriiiar with procedures at the theatre. Standing n the middle of the city in its own square, ;ust off Nevsky Prospekt, the enormous yellow building could seat nearly 2,000 people, so the production of new plavs was not entered into lightly. But having your play staged at the Abxandrnsky was hardly a casual undertaking for authors either.
Chekhov travelled up from Moscow a couple of weeks before the first night of Ivanov in order to attend rehearsals. The wrangles he had with the actor playing the lead did not inspire confidence: Vladim'r Davydov had played Ivanov in the original Moscow production, but the part had now changed and he did not understand it. There were other casting problems, which caused the date of the premiere to be delayed by a few days. Despite Chekhov's misapprehensions, however, Ivanov proved to be a huge success, and the author was given a standing ovation after the third act. The enthusiastic reviews which appeared in New Times and The Petersburg Newspaper only enhanced Chekhov's already high standing in the eyes of the Petersburg public. Suvorin's wife wrote to Chekhov that in seven years of going to the Alexandrinsky, she had never been so moved. She was one of many friends and admirers who wrote to him in similarly ecstatic terms.43 At some point during this visit, Chekhov had his photograph taken at Shapiro's studio on Nevsky Prospekt. A few months later his brother Alexander wrote to tell him that Shapiro had put the portrait in his window and that it was attracting a lot of attention from passers-by. On one occasion Alexander eavesdropped on the conversation of a group of young ladies as they stood there with their faces pressed to the glass, and reported to his brother that they had detected passion in his eyes, and had even admired his L_e. He was most disgruntled, however, that none of them had talked about his brother's soul or his intelligence.44
Hot on the heels of Ivanov came Chekhov's one-act farce The Bear. It created a furore when it was premiered at the Alexandrinsky on 7 February 1889. The female lead, Eiena Popova ('a comely widow landowner with dimples n her cheeks'), was played by the great Maria Savina, and when Chekhov fulminated against Petersburg theatre in 1901, he made an except'on for her, as well as a partial exception for Davydov. The Bear had become a favourite with the amateur dramatics fraternity all over Russia after its first performance in Moscow the previous October. Even before the Petersburg premiere, Chekhov was proudly able to inform his friends that it had been enthusiastically staged by the Imperial Ministers of Finance and Foreign Affairs in their home-spun productions.' And then there was Chekhov's other perennially popular one-act farce The Proposal, which was premiered, in St Petersburg on 12 Apiil at a small chamber theatre, and then staged at the Alexandrinsky on 12 September. That summer even royalty had dabbled with Chekhov. On 10 August, the Alexandi nsky actor Pavel Svobod.n wrote to tell Chekhov that he had just acted in The Proposal before the Tsar. The command performance had taken place in the little wooden theatre located L i Krasnoe Selo, ust outside the c;ty, where the troops were stationed during the summer months. The theatre employed members of the imperial troupes to perform comedies, operettas and ballets for members of court and other highly placed officials whi'e they were at their dachas. Svoboa n reported to Chekhov that the imperial family and their retinue had much enjoyed the show, with Alexander III laughing particularly loudiy. Indeed, he said, the cast had received two curtain calls, which was unheard of in that stuffy, protocol-infested theatre. The Tsar's Eye may have been disapproving, but the Tsar himself not only read Chekhov, but was a fan, it turned out, when the actors were presented to him afterwards.46 Chekhov was very amused. 'I am awaiting the order of St Stanislav and appointment to the State Council,' he wrote to a friend.47 That was unlikely, however, as the Tsar did not really know who he was. Alexander III saw The Bear many times, and invariably went to congratulate Svobodin on his performance in the title role, telLig him how much he had laughed. He would also invariably ask who the author was. 'The author of