11 - Pinter in Russia

Summary

In the market revolution sweeping through Russia, theatre has played its own part. Musicals, foreign adaptations and zippy updated classics have long since replaced the stodgy orthodoxy of Soviet times. There is also a strong interest in the work of Harold Pinter. At first sight, the reasons seem clear: first, the advent of Glasnost in the mid-1980s liberated an interest in work which, though sometimes privately circulated, could not generally be seen onstage during the Soviet years; secondly, the pro-Western impulse, following major social and political reform, concentrated this interest on English-speaking writers; thirdly, in a time of rapid and bewildering change, Russians found in Pinter's work in particular a strong echo of their own situation. Yet, on closer analysis, these reasons raise further questions. Were Pinter's plays never to be seen in Russia before 1985? Was the 'pro-Western impulse' in itself sufficient to account for an interest in the work of Harold Pinter? What precisely in their own situation do Russians find echoed in Harold Pinter's plays? In addressing these questions, this chapter falls into two parts. First, I shall give a critical account of a number of notable Pinter productions which ran in Moscow between 1972 and 1994, focusing on one famous early production. Concurrently, I shall try to set each production in the context of the tumultuous social and political events of the period. Second, I examine the line of development which links these productions; that is, how they interrelate a particular understanding of Pinter's work with changing attitudes to the unfolding events of recent Russian history. From 1991 I began to spend extended periods in Moscow, researching Russian theatre. Increasingly, I was distracted from Russian drama and drawn towards the often more influential Russian-language productions of English and American plays.