History of the Sakha Theater

By Valentina Chusovskaya.

The history is always the interpretation of the facts. It is considered, that October 17, 1925 is the birthday of the Yakut drama theatre. It is quite right, but it would be a mistake to consider this date as the beginning of development of theatrical culture of Yakut people. This mistake arises because the Soviet aesthetics tried to separate art from religion in every possible way and consequently treated the beginning of professional theatre as the beginning of a theatrical art.

In many republics of Russia it is still considered that they did not have theatre before the Soviet authority. But they forget that no art can be created without strong-willed effort. Because art is not a toy of mankind, not the attribute of development of human consciousness, it is a spirit which beginning is expressed in primitive mystical ritual.

But the beginning of a professional theatrical art is the significant date; it's a start point of conscious development, and fostering of art culture of people. The historical way of Sakha Academic drama theatre of P.A.Ojunskiy is the way of becoming of theatre olonkho , classical theatre of Sakha people, and construction of a new Euroasian theatrical aesthetics.

There is a development of new forms with occurrence of amateur theatre. The first amateur performances was brought to stage in Yakutia in 1910. On October 17, 1925 the professional drama theatre was opened with first performance "Malicious spirit" by N.D.Neustroev's comedy. A.I.Sofronov, a poet and the playwright, one of founders of the Yakut fiction, political and public figure, was the first director of national theatre. D.D.Bolshev was invited to be a director; and the first professional director of theatre became S.A.Grigorjev (1933 - 1958), the organizer of amateur theatre in Viluysk . In 1934 the name of the founder of the Yakut Soviet literature, the public figure and scientist-linguist P.A.Ojunskiy was given to theatre.

During the Soviet period the Sakha theatre mastered Russian and West-European theatrical aesthetics and continued to develop national repertoire. From 1963 till 1982 F .F.Potapov supervised the theatre. With his arrival the theatrical aesthetics, that was brightly expressed in performances "Morning of Lena" and "Naara Suoh" by I.Gogolev, "the Parent field" by C.Ajtmatov, varies. These three performances are three directions of creativity of director Potapov: the first one is flashing comic folklore theatre; the second direction attempts to connect poetics of olonkho with psychological theatre; the third one is poetic theatre which bright representative in the Russian theatre was J.Ljubimov.

In 1982 Andrey Borisov comes on change to Potapov. He continued the started business and at the same time generated theatre of essentially new quality - epic theatre: he brought the achievement of world theatre to the ground of the Yakut national culture and camr to the form of classical national theatre “ Olonkho” . This way began from performance "My desired blue coast...", which in 1986 has been awarded with the State premium of the USSR .

Performance "My desired blue coast..." by Chingiz Ajtmatov "Skewbald dog running along the edge of the sea", directed by Andrey Borisov, under the Gennady Sotnikov's scenography and in Carl Serguchev's musical registration. It became the card of Sakha theatre. Eternal universal symbols (the boat, desired coast, stars, birds, a ladle, a drink of clean water and the dramatic art based on laws of classical antique tragedy) defined ethical and aesthetic essence of creative activity of Sakha theatre for many years. The new level of promotion begins with this performance in theatre " Olonkho” , and the present festival in Ulan-Ude will be opened with this performance.

New work of Sakha theatre is the scenic version of the novel of national writer of Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) Nikolay Luginov "On command of Chingishan" directed by A.Borisov. It was prepared for I Nomadic International theatrical festival "Desired coast" which initiator was Sakha theatre marking its anniversary. It will be shown on closing of festival.

All events of performance are in a flash - decision-making of Temuchin-Chingishan : to execute or not to execute Jamuha , violated the law. The consciousnesses of the shaman draw stages of forthcoming tragic events. Brothers inevitably separate, they are separated by life; friendship-enmity of Jamuha and Temuchin becomes the main line of performance. Sacrifice of Jamuha , the contender of Temuchin, is comprehended as an act in the name of association of steppe peoples around Chingishan.

After the festival Sakha theatre went to Mongolia , Tuva , Khakassia where besides festival plays it will show two performances: "Kyys Debilie" and "Macbet" by S.Potapov. If performance "Desired coast" is the beginning of the way than performance-olonkho "Kyys Debilie " ("the Gold mask" owner of 2002) is an output to classical Sakha theatre, generated in the beginning of XXI century.

E.Ionesko's comic melodrama " Macbet" ("the Gold mask" owner of 2005) directed by young director Sergey Potapov is somewhat already tradition: " Macbet" is a diploma performance of the young director in which features of the artist's person and theatrical predilections definitely appear. Michael Egorov's bright, original scenography combines features of national and European theatre.

Today Sakha theatre occupies the niche in world theatrical culture. The troupe of theatre is made by graduates of five generations of the Moscow theatrical school by M.S.Chepkin at Small theatre of Russia. The new theatre demands new actor's school. Andrey Borisov, Efim Stepanov, Gerasim Vasiliev , Stepanida Borisova bring up actors and directors of new generation. In the festival students of the Arctic state institute of culture and arts will play together with masters of a stage.

To the 80 th anniversary Sakha theatre became the leader among theatres of the Asian regions. It carries uniting mission. Theme of Chingishan opens from the new side, it finds philosophical sounding. Andrey Borisov writes in a salutatory word to festival: "who is he that brought happiness and misfortune to multilingual Asian tribes, united them in uniform prospering invincible empire? Who is he, whose severe, cold validity gives the creeps? Where are born high ideas, ideas about the general blessing? How are born the pulses transforming affairs in acts? We still face a lot of questions... Who knows! Perhaps, our festival "Desired coast" will be understood then as one of harbingers of new Russia realizing itself as the Eurasian unification ".