Published on: 2026-09-09
Source: Moscow Government – Правительства Москвы –
An important disclaimer is at the bottom of this article.
Autumn is the long-awaited season of theatrical premieres, for which actors, directors, and artists have been preparing for months. This September, audiences can expect dozens of new performances based on the works of classic and contemporary playwrights. Here is what you can see at “Praktika,” the Moscow Academic Theater named after V.V. Mayakovsky, the Moscow Drama Theater named after N.V. Gogol, the Moscow State Theater “Lenkom Mark Zakharov,” and the Theater on Trubnaya.
Family thought
Almost 150 years have passed since the monumental novel “Anna Karenina” by Leo Tolstoy about fatal passion and tragic fate was written. The plot remains relevant to this day: large-scale performances are staged in musical, ballet, and drama theaters, which reinterpret the work in new ways.
Director Egor Peregudov in Mayakovsky Theater set out not only to tell the tragic story of the heroine, but also to look at what happened from a different angle. In the play “Karenina. Volume Two” The action begins after the most dramatic events — Anna’s meeting with Vronsky, the start of their affair, and the difficult confrontation with Karenin — have already occurred.
“Working with prose allows us to show the subjective views of different characters. Part of the play the audience will see through Karenin’s eyes, part through Vronsky’s eyes, and part through Dolly’s eyes. And only the third act — directly through Anna’s eyes. This is not the story of one person. It is the story of a family — the breakup of one and the failure of another. Following Tolstoy, we call the genre of the play ‘a family thought,'” says Egor Peregudov.
Leo Tolstoy’s novel is a multifaceted and complex work about a tragic choice, painful love, and the thirst for happiness. The author invites us to observe the breakup of the Karenin couple, Anna’s attempt to find happiness with Vronsky, and the harmonious relationship between Kitty and Levin.
“Tolstoy is interesting and strong in details, nuances, and, of course, psychology: the understanding of how complex and nonlinear the relationships between a man and a woman are. How difficult it is to preserve love and build a family. It is precisely this that we want to explore in detail. We await a thoughtful audience at the performance, one who is interested not in a retelling of the plot, but in the search for a theatrical language equivalent to Tolstoy’s epic novelistic word,” the director adds.
Viewers will be able to appreciate one of the most grandiose productions of the Mayakovsky Theatre. According to the artist Vladimir Arefyev, each of the three acts of the performance differs from the others, and the stage design completely changes from act to act. The dynamics reflect the evolution of the artistic language: it begins with Tolstoyan realism and then gradually transitions to a fantastical, conventional aesthetic — to a theater of stream of consciousness. The roles in the performance will be played by Darya Ursulyak, Alexey Fateev, Makar Zaporozhsky, Ivan Vybornov, Anastasia Mishina, Yulia Silaeva, and other actors. The shows will take place on September 12, 13, and 26, as well as on October 24 and 25.
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A Return to the Roots
What happens if you find yourself in an enclosed space in the Far North? This question is answered by the play “Black Blizzard”, the premiere of which will take place at the theater “Praktika”. The play was created by Anastasia Bukreeva, with roles performed by the actors of the “Dmitry Brusnikin Workshop.”
The play immerses the audience in a tense, almost apocalyptic atmosphere. The main character, Sverdlov, is an office worker who arrives on a business trip from the capital to the northern city of N. The elements abruptly and suddenly change the familiar life: the airport closes, communication disappears, and a black blizzard hits. It not only rages outside the windows but literally erases familiar landmarks, turning reality into something unstable and unsettling. In this isolation, Sverdlov increasingly mentally returns to his family’s story. Memories become his way of holding on at the edge of a collapsing world.
Gradually, the hero learns to see and accept hidden emotions—not only in those around him but also within himself. Love in the play is revealed not as an impulse but as a difficult, sometimes painful, acquisition of connection with another person. It arises despite coldness, alienation, and frightening uncertainty and becomes the hero’s only real support.
“This work contains humor and self-irony, which is very important to me. Many modern plays are built on negation, but ‘Black Blizzard’ is built on love. This text has a kaleidoscope of themes—from searching for roots to the sins of the fathers. I am interested in the hero’s journey. How can one exist at the northernmost point of the world? Only if you love. I see a connection here with the thought of an Eastern philosopher, ‘happiness is the state of non-comparison’: first, you must remove external frameworks, love yourself, and then learn to love others. Despite the linguistic simplicity of the play, this is embedded in it,” says director Sergei Shchedrin.
The play will be shown on October 3 and 4.
Of Fathers and Sons
How to keep love in your heart despite all hardships? Are children capable of responding to their parents with the same tenderness they received from them? And what pain does each of us endure behind a smile? In The Gogol Theatre the viewer can find the answers to these questions on their own, and the production will help “Then—silence” based on the play by Vina Delmar “Road to Tomorrow.” Director Anton Yakovlev intended to create a performance about love, parents and children, loneliness and silence, but with references to the work of the cult Italian director.
“The idea for the form of this performance was inspired by the work of Federico Fellini, whom I have always admired and loved. Here, deep drama instantly flows into grotesque comedy and back again. The performance features a lot of music, with a live ‘Fellini-style’ orchestra on stage, which runs throughout the entire plot. For me, the ‘breaking character’ moments—personal monologues by the actors in the stand-up genre—are very important, because ultimately this story is primarily about us today. The actors share their own problems, complexes, and pain with the audience,” says Anton Yakovlev.
The play’s plot tells the story of an elderly couple, Barkley and Lucy, who have been through a lot together. One day, the parents gather their five children to deliver sad news: their last possession — the house — is being taken away because of debts. The spouses ask their sons and daughters for help, but they are all too busy with their own concerns. Having thought of nothing better, the children separate the parents: the daughter takes the father to her home, and the mother is sent to a nursing home. More than anything in the world, Barkley and Lucy dream of one thing — to be together again.
“A few years ago, I already approached this material. It is a poignant story of ordinary people who lived a hundred years ago, yet it seems surprisingly modern: the same problems between fathers and children, the same pain, the same attempts to understand each other. This theme still concerns me, which is why I am staging a new version here, in my own theater, with my own actors. The average age of my audience has become younger, and I am very interested to see their reaction to this material. There has not yet been a play of this genre in our theater,” adds the director.
The roles will be performed by People’s Artist of Russia Viktor Rakov, People’s Artist of Russia Anna Yakunina, Andrey Finyagin, Alena Goncharova, Sofya Kovaleva, and other actors. The performances will take place on September 9, October 3, and October 15.
Another play about the relationships between fathers and children can be seen at the Theater on Trubnaya. The premiere of the performance took place on September 3. “Malice and Love”, the plot of which focuses the viewer’s attention on the themes of love, honor, and duty. Friedrich Schiller wrote a play of the same name in 1784, but not much has changed since then.
The artistic director of the theater and the director of the play Dmitry Astrakhan says: “This is a story about two people from different worlds who are drawn to each other — and cannot cope with what divides them. He is a hostage of his circle, where everything is subject to power and political games. She sacrifices love for the sake of her father. Both want one thing: simply to be themselves. Simply normal human relationships.”
The creators of the play made their own translation of Friedrich Schiller’s play, striving to preserve the author’s style and poetics to make the text more accessible. And they chose young actors for the roles, similar in age to the characters in the work.
“It was important for us to convey the feeling of first youthful love, and for this we invited young creative people. Essentially, these are their debuts: some have just recently graduated from university, others are still studying. Meanwhile, they have already managed to play small roles with us,” the director says.
The role of Louisa is played for the first time by actress Polina Mamysheva, and Ferdinand by recent theater school graduate Yevgeny Zinkevich. The next performance of the play will take place on September 23.
From loneliness — to love
On September 2, it was the 100th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding Soviet actor Yevgeny Leonov. In the theater “Lenkom of Mark Zakharov” this date is celebrated in a special way. The artistic director of the theater and director Vladimir Pankov created a performance “Eldest Son, or Letters to a Son. Dedicated to Yevgeny Leonov”.
The production is based on the plot of Vitaly Melnikov’s cult film “The Elder Son” and the memoir book by Yevgeny Leonov “Letters to My Son.” In it, the artist expressed the full depth of parental feelings, shared life experience and reflections on the profession with his son Andrey. “Art possesses the rare gift of focusing a person on their spiritual world, that is, on themselves. Without this, it is impossible to live,” wrote Yevgeny Pavlovich.
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The actor left unforgettable roles in the minds of viewers, filled with sincerity, honesty, and kind humor that touches the soul for decades. The film “The Senior Son” revealed all facets of his talent.
“With Yevgeny Pavlovich Leonov, I have watched practically everything at Lenkom. It was impossible to take your eyes off him. Leonov is a unique phenomenon in our art,” recalled People’s Artist of the RSFSR Mikhail Boyarsky.
Yevgeny Leonov played the role of musician and caring family father Andrey Sarafanov in the film. Possessing genuine benevolence and trustfulness, he is ready to accept into the family even the student Vladimir Busygin (Nikolai Karachentsov), who decided to play a cruel joke by passing himself off as an illegitimate son. As a result of this prank, even after confessing to the deception, the young man gains love and a father’s support. Mikhail Boyarsky played the role of Silva, Busygin’s friend.
The play “The Elder Son, or Letters to the Son. A Dedication to Yevgeny Leonov” will be a warm remembrance of the actor. The role of the head of the family will be performed by Yevgeny Leonov’s son, People’s Artist of Russia Andrey Leonov. Performances will take place on September 9 and 10, as well as on October 22.
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