In memory of Vladislav Pazi

On 16 June will see a performance of Betrothal in a Monastery dedicated to the memory of stage director Vladislav Pazi.

Betrothal in a Monastery is one of few operas in the repertoire of the Mariinsky Theatre to have been staged by a drama theatre director. In 1996 Vladislav Pazi (1945-2006) was invited to stage it. His name, unknown just two years ago in St Petersburg’s theatre world, was, back then, known by everyone connected with the theatre. He came from the Aitmatov Theatre in Bishkek which he had directed for eight years and staged productions at the Komissarzhevskaya Theatre which proved instant hits – Lady of the Camellias (1994) and Double Suicide (1995). Audiences were desperate to see them and critics were split into camps of admirers and haters – because both these plays, created together with the designer Alla Kozhenkova, were not at all in line with theatre fashion; the designs were rich and the casts were huge. Moreover, Pazi preferred melodrama to all other genres which guaranteed success with audiences. In the director’s desire to seize the audience’s attention, however, there lay no secret desire for fame but rather for the creation of a theatre that would entertain and bring pleasure to eyes that were tired of everyday life and stir up feelings.
That’s how he came to the Mariinsky Theatre, together with Alla Kozhenkova being engaged to stage the theatre’s third production of Prokofiev’s Betrothal. Unlike the rather modest decisions taken in the productions of Ilya Shlepyanov (1946) and Alexei Kireyev (1961), Pazi’s production enchanted with its stage magnificence. The stage director found the key to the opera in the dazzling and life-affirming music, recreating the richness of the musical plot visually on the stage.
The plot of Shakespeare’s comedy The Duenna on which Prokofiev based his opera takes place in Spain, where thanks to the cunning of a servant all of the love intrigues are happily resolved. Prokofiev referred to the play as champagne from which “one could write an opera in the style of Mozart or Rossini!” Pazi, obeying the character of the music and the play, revealed onstage a theatrical carnival in the Spanish style with metre-wide farthingales in the women’s dresses, wigs, dazzling masks and an apogee of theatrical beauty – an immense fan that transformed into the stage indicating the action was about to start. But the set designs and costumes were only the starting point for the production’s real gems – the performers themselves. For them Vladislav Pazi provided the opportunity to bring the masks to life in the performance, allowing the performers greater freedom.
In Betrothal to mark the stage director’s seventieth birthday Larisa Diadkova and Gennady Bezzubenkov will be appearing onstage, who at the premiere of the production comprised the enchanting and incredibly funny duet of the Duenna and Mendoza. Nineteen years on they will be enacting the full theatrical wittiness of Vladislav Pazi’s Betrothal for the umpteenth time; it was his only opera production and was unexpectedly the last production by a great master which may still be seen today in St Petersburg.
Vita Chushkina