From the life of a tablet rat. Journal room Kochergin notes of a tablet rat read online

Edward Kochergin. Tablet Rat Notes. - St. Petersburg: Vita Nova, 2013.

Ask a preschooler about the most important people in life - he, of course, will call mom and dad and grandparents. Also - a favorite kindergarten teacher, a beautiful girl Nastya from his group, a friend Sasha from the second entrance and some aunt Sveta - my mother's friend, who always fills up with sweets. Ask this guy a similar question in twenty years - the list will definitely change. And it will become much wider. Parents, most likely, will remain, but in place of Aunt Sveta and beautiful girl Nastya will come completely different people. In another fifty years, yesterday's boy will list dozens of wonderful people who met on his way and left indelible marks in his memory.

Always remember the most bright personalities. You are unlikely to be able to name absolutely all your classmates, classmates and comrades from previous places of work. However, among them will certainly be found those about whom it would be worth telling the public.

Reading the memoirs of famous people is doubly interesting. On the pages of memories famous musicians be sure to find the names of their colleagues and personal stories associated with laurel-crowned buddies. Famous writers will inevitably share stories with the participation of their friends - the same famous writers and poets. Well, experienced politicians will reveal facts that will never be told in the history books.

A new book by Eduard Kochergin, Notes of a Tablet Rat, autobiographical stories from which were published in Znamya in 2010-2012, is a peculiar memoir: most of the heroes - famous personalities - fade into the background, giving way to people who are used to always being behind backstage.

For forty s extra years Kochergin is the chief artist of the St. Petersburg Bolshoi drama theater. Fate brought him together with outstanding directors and legendary artists, however, “Notes of a Tablet Rat” is largely dedicated not to them at all, but to small, often even little-known people, thanks to whom the theater lives.

“The tablet rat is a comic intra-theatre title. It was assigned to experienced, talented or, as they said in ancient times, cunning workers of theatrical production units and decoration workshops. Thus, one Tablet Rat decided to tell us about his colleagues who deserve the right to bear this unusual title.

In the first chapter, with the characteristic title "Shards of Memory", which, in theory, could be called the entire book, the author compares the theater with big ship. For the ship to move confidently along sea, we need not only an experienced captain and a certain number of sailors - there must be a well-coordinated team. Every, even the smallest screw is important in the system. The names of these "cogs" Kochergin begins to list. Here are the "bosuns" - stage machinists Bystrov, Velimeev and Azrieli, here is the magnificent carpenter Silvestrov, here are the "theatrical Germans" Hoffmann and Neugebauer, here are the brilliant performers Meshkov and Zandin, here is the layout artist Nikolaev, here is the applicator and props Karenina, here is " captains of theatrical production" Gerasimenko and Kuvarin, here are the "classics theatrical light» Klimovsky and Kutikov... For everyone with whom the author had a chance to work in different years, he finds good words. Even despite the fact that Kochergin had to swear and argue with some, he unconditionally recognizes their skill and professionalism.

Already in the first chapter, rather bitter thoughts begin to slip through, which will be repeated several times in the book. Their essence can be reduced to the lines of Lermontov: "Yes, there were people in our time, / Not like the current tribe ...". The author notes that many of today's theater workers are not like the great masters of the era of his youth. They worked on their own, not shifting work to junior colleagues. They did not require additional payment for invented and beautifully implemented creative ideas. They did not pursue titles and awards. They served real art, and did not work out the hours agreed upon under the contract. In the story "Copper Goga", which is included in the book, the author notes that now "we, the artists, need elementary design, nothing more", although earlier the directors built a whole staging philosophy and set the most complex and at the same time incredibly interesting scenes for the workers tasks.

What is it - a common opinion among people with experience: "In our time, even the sun shone brighter ..." or is it still a fair insult to the new formation of theatrical figures who replaced serious art with scandalous performances?

Kochergin deliberately avoids such petty disputes, preferring to devote more space on the pages of the book to inconspicuous and indispensable theatrical wizards of the past decades. Joiners, modelers, stage workers, artists found real happiness in their work, creating small masterpieces with their own hands.

Professional writers and publishers begin to read any book that falls into their hands not from the cover and title page, but from the output. Who issued the publication, who is the editor, who is the layout designer, in which printing house it was printed. This is important, although the average reader may not reach such information, typed in small print on the last page.

Kochergin, with great respect and even love, reveals to us not only the names, but also the life stories of almost invisible theater workers of the Soviet years. Each of them had their own eventful original fate. A professional chemist, Bulatov, who created unique paints for theatrical costumes and scenery, adored the opera, cooked superbly and mastered the art of paper cutting. The taciturn carpenter-Veps Shcherbakov, amazingly wielding a small hatchet, heroically went through the Great Patriotic War. The artist Klavdy Ippolitovich, nicknamed Begemotushka, turned out to be a real connoisseur and connoisseur of antiques. Model builder Nikolaev, whose childhood fell on the harsh years of the siege, became Kochergin's reliable and faithful companion in his wanderings in the Russian North. Many stories, alas, end sadly. Shcherbakov, without waiting for his grandson-heir, to whom he could pass on his miracle hatchet, went to last way in a coffin made by one's own hands. Behemoth's life was cut short before the trial for speculation in antiques. The artist Shambraev, who invented the amazing theater of chickens, died of a heart attack when he was forced out of his apartment and ate his trained laying hens. The circus legend Filatov did not have time to bring to mind his bear theater. And the king of clowns, Hasan Musin, began to drink too much after an absurd and terrible street story with a fake revolver that "killed" the robber.

The essential value of the book lies precisely in the fact that the author of "Notes ..." brings back to life forgotten by many, and even generally unknown names. However, unknown names in the work closely coexist with well-known ones. Figuratively speaking, the author opens the door for us to the world of celebrities of the Soviet era, with whom he was destined to work together for some time. The reader can learn things about which in official biographies usually silent. For example, director Boris Ravenskikh, although he had a terribly complex character, always knew exactly what he wanted and knew how to set precise goals. The real "sage of the ancient workshop of actors" Oleg Borisov also appears in the book in new, deeply personal images. Several backstage secrets the author will reveal to us in the story "Copper Gog" - and these secrets will be associated with the names of Efim Kopelyan, Sergei Yursky, Vladislav Strzhelchik. The story itself occupies a special place in the book. It is dedicated to Georgy Tovstonogov and is built in the form of dialogues between the author and the monument to the Master, erected several years ago in the center of St. Petersburg. Each meeting with "Copper Goga" evokes memories of the stages of joint work. General intentions, rehearsals, performances, foreign trips... There were many difficulties and obstacles, but the achievements and victories compensated for everything. And now the BDT is no longer the same, and the great masters are leaving.

People visit cemeteries to stand near the graves of departed loved ones, to remember glorious moments from the past when everyone was alive, to talk about current affairs. Approximately this is how Kochergin communicates with Tovstonogov, who died almost twenty-five years ago.

The monument to Georgy Tovstonogov stands in the square that bears his name. His name was given to the Bolshoi Drama Theater in 1992. I would like to believe that thanks to the Notes of a Tablet Rat, the memory of the little-known theater masters, whose names and photographs are cited by Eduard Kochergin in his book, will also come to life.

Amazing Stories of a Theater Artist

Who is a tablet rat and how does it differ from a barn rat? The fact that this one is a tablet is nothing more than an honorary title. It was awarded to masters of the theater who reached heights in their craft. One of them - a wonderful theater artist Eduard Kochergin - wrote the book "Notes of a Tablet Rat". The work turned out to be so popular that it has already gone through the second edition. The MK observer could not pass by him.

Eduard Kochergin is already 77. 50 of them he worked in the legendary Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) BDT on the Fontanka. A man with an amazing fate, a sharp look, a direct character, which brought him many difficulties. And what should talent do - either the truth or nothing. The third book in a row - only the truth.

Her heroes are those whom it is not customary to even mention, not only in reviews and articles, even in theater programs. These are the same tablet rats - props, modellers, dyers, cutters and representatives of theatrical professions, without whose hand-made works and talent the Soviet, and later Russian theater, could not do.

A tablet rat is not an image. “The Shutov's initiation into the dignity of the Tablet Rat took place once a year on the day of St. Novgorod Bishop Nikita - February 13, according to the new style. This saint was considered either the patron of toothy-tailed living creatures on earth, or a fighter against it, in any case, his memorial day was the most beneficial day of the fight against rats, Kochergin writes at the beginning of the book. - Dedicated to the dignity of a high commission, consisting of eminent, wise theatrical professionals who have had this glorious title since ancient times. The ceremony was held in a darkened, picturesque hall of theater workshops, closed from outsiders, with numerous candles, and ironically imitated a Masonic ceremony. Members of the commission in triangular caps with tassels sat at the eastern wall of the hall at a long table covered with mouse-colored cloth. A path of the same color led from the layout room across the entire hall to the center of the table. The initiate was put on it, and at the ringing of the bell of the chief assessor, the culprit began to slowly approach the table to the sounds of the march of soldiers from Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker.

Yes, this ceremony was more than theatrical in nature, and the new initiate received a coveted casket, in which lay (attention!!!) a dried mouse tail. Kochergin found several outstanding tablet rats and described them in detail, deliciously in a book.

Striking portraits of the most modest people - fragments of the imperial army, miraculously preserved in theaters, the last tailor from the village - who built uniforms (namely built) for members royal family, a Vepsian peasant from a Chukhonian farm. Amazing masters, amazing destinies. Here, for example, is the last Russian emperor. Shvalnik, although it looks like an abusive "trash", actually means "military tailor". His name was simply Alexander Sergeevich, and his grandfathers and great-grandfathers, the serfs of the Romanovs, sewed military uniforms for their boyars. But let's be precise according to Kochergin - they didn’t sew, but built military uniforms, because:

“The human spine straightened in them, he held a warrior in the saddle. And in the present, shielded, you are no longer a warrior, but an anika-warrior ... You have lost respect for the cause, so the words went wrong. The meaning of the words is turned upside down, and our whole life, on the contrary, rolled back and forth. Previously, to spoil our trousers meant to sew trousers, and there was nothing so bad in this word. And wait to spoil - to spoil means. You walk in spoiled clothes, and you yourself are spoiled, but what you do - spoil everything, spoil your life.

So says real hero theater artist books And there are enough of these for more than 300 pages. The language is juicy, uncombed, they don’t speak like that now. Yes, there are none. And the time has gone. And it's a pity, especially how you honor the witness Kochergin and envy him: responsible people were for the word, with honor, and had dignity. All for sale - did not.

	Scenery sketch for the play "Sheep and Wolves"

For example, there was such an actor Shambraev, who served in the regional theater of drama and comedy. pungent, pure soul man, he sang lullabies to his sick and bedridden wife (he was 30 years older than him). And he kept a chicken theater in the house. Yes, yes, it was the chickens that were his actresses - he trained them and thus earned money for a living. When Edik Kochergin, then still a young artist, came to his house, he saw an unthinkable performance: chickens walked in formation, bowing in turn. Or the furniture maker Ivan, a Veps by nationality, made furniture without a single nail - a bed, a wardrobe, a sideboard. Not talkative, besides fingerless, he worked real miracles. In his house, behind a closet, there was a coffin, also made without nails. In it he was buried. “A noble domino worked for himself,” other masters said admiringly, accepting the very fact of death without horror: God cleaned up a person.

	Costume design for Telok for the play "King Henry IV"

Notes of the Tablet Rat are interesting from a historical point of view: there are many facts that even an experienced theatergoer does not suspect, and there is enough funny and incredible in them. Some facts of the regime Soviets are shocking. Yes, she was not a regime, if the director of the theater Yankovsky (clever, polyglot) extinguished a terrible womanish intrigue with the help of immorality. And it was like this: they threw Yankovsky into the theater, where the troupe ate the artistic directors and in general it was a nightmare. There were not a dozen timid people, since he agreed to enter the cage with the raging "predators", but he set two conditions for the city leadership: he would be allocated a Volga car, at that time a terrible deficit, and the driver would be raised twice the salary. There is no way out - they agreed to the conditions.

The director appeared at the theater accompanied by a tall, handsome driver Misha, and in a few days they converted the brand new Volga into a cozy nest, removing the front seat. Further events unfolded as follows: in the morning Misha left for the forest with one of the actresses - the ringleader - and returned her to the evening quiet and sweet. For two months, Misha's actresses changed, the situation in the theater gradually calmed down, until the scandal turned into calm. Misha resigned, returned to his taxi company, where director Yankovsky found him. Is this possible today? And is there such a wit in the director's corps? Hardly. Social networks raise such a howl that the director, who pacified the troupe in this way, soldered the term.

	Costume design for Henry IV for the play "King Henry IV"

And how much compassionate Kochergin has, but tender and piercing - the heart squeezes, but ... Here's what is surprising: with all the love with which people are described, every chapter ends sadly in Kochergin. Or maybe because with love - he lost a person who became for him long years something special, informal. And in connection with this - a few poignant chapters dedicated to the greatest director of the last century Georgy Tovstonogov. They are written in the form of "witnesses", that is, dates with a director who is no longer alive. Kochergin comes to the monument, which is placed near the master's house, and talks to him. And sometimes he drinks vodka with him. The degree of openness and openness of the author even frightens.

I call Eduard Kochergin in St. Petersburg:

- Eduard Stepanovich, and I remember Lisa the dyer in the Moscow Art Theater - she was an amazing craftswoman ...

What do you mean, in the Moscow Art Theater (I produced four performances there) there were amazing masters. I found Serebryakova there, the daughter of a famous artist, she worked as the main performer. I was lucky: I didn't just know - I worked with these people. Dyer ... Yes, you can tell her on the phone: “Make it half a tone lighter” - she understood everything. And now artists do not know such simple things, like those people without education. In St. Petersburg, we had an amazing props Masha - so all the theaters of the city ordered vegetables and fruits for her, so she sewed them. She made great money.

But all of them are described in such detail, so preserved speech characteristic each, in some places intricate, as if you parted with them yesterday. Did you record for them?

No, I guess my memory is so good.

- About the chicken theater... It was really so unique, I can't imagine?

Certainly an absolutely incredible sight. And this artist was amazing, physiological - only Evgeny Lebedev was like that. The fact is that chickens - it was his part-time job. Then all the artists worked part-time, because the salaries were small. And Shambraev trained chickens, another artist was an excellent shoemaker, someone bound books ... Here Oleg Borisov, by the way, was an exceptional bookbinder, although famous, with good earnings. He had a chic library, but at the same time he made the purest and most delicious vodka that I have ever drunk. And what about his pickles - mushrooms, zucchini, cauliflower, watermelon rinds, carrots?.. Nothing could have been tastier! And the actor is brilliant. Although he never called himself that. Once only to me, when I praised his bindings, I said: "Thank God, in old age there is something to feed on."

You know, it’s kind of sad after your book, because you understand that such unique masters not left. Yes, you actually write about it yourself.

Now everything has changed. Manual labor, everything was done by hand, and there were no such machines as now. I told Joseph Brodsky, when he lived in my apartment for four and a half months, with whom I work in the regional drama and comedy theater, he laughed and admired very much.

You write that directors who are ready to take risks and who appreciate the work of an artist, who take ideas from him have disappeared…

Now artists serve directors. Yes, there is also Dodin, who works with Borovsky, there is Zhenovach… And most of them use artists as designers. I can't say why this is happening. Times are different, and so are people. I have met and worked with very educated directors. Do you know that Tovstonogov, in addition to being a very smart and witty person, was fluent in two languages ​​- French and German? He knew the plays he staged by heart. And now culture and education have fallen sharply - well, it's just a shame. The main thing now is ambition. Tovstonogov's ambitions were of a different order. Once I asked him: “What is the essence of your profession?” He replied, "Little Tsakhes' philosophy: all good things are all mine." That is, he took the best from all the people that surrounded him, and did not demonstrate himself.

And what is the essence of the profession of a theater artist? I liked how Eduard Kochergin answers this question in his book: “ theater artist hands feed, legs carry, eyes roam, and the head in the four corners is looking for the fifth.

, published at the end of last year in The Banner, a requiem for a bygone era, a titanic lamento of the last of the Mohicans, doomed to silently watch the ruin of family nests. Having survived the years of hard times, today the keeper of the traditions of the Tovstonogov theater stands at the origins of the new BDT, rewritten by the artistic director of the theaterAndrey Mighty . It is in the Bolshoi Drama Theater, with the history of which the name of Kochergin is inextricably linked, that the presentation of the Notes of a Tablet Rat will take place in September. The right of the first publication of a fragment of the book was kindly granted by the Vita Nova publishing house to COLTA.RU.

You will sigh about one thing, but it’s a pity for everyone ...
Gavrilikh, cleaning lady of the workshops of the Theater. V.F. Komissarzhevskaya

To our Behemoth, God rest his soul, the wisdom of the Blatyar world “the greed of the fraer ruined” at once fits. And it ended with fright right in court in front of the people who came to hear the case. At first no one understood what had happened to him. The judge for the second time asks Klavdy Ippolitovich, that is, Behemoth, about some glasses of Venetian glass, but he is no longer there - he squints from the floor at everyone from the other world. And somehow it all happened quickly. At first, sitting on the prisoner's chair, he suddenly shook all over, snored softly, then shrank and slowly dripped from it onto the floor. Already lying, still snoring in last time- and the end, strum-scream, it’s not there, only one stream murmurs from under it over the tiles ...

So the front-line soldier-order-bearer, wood turner Egory Gavrilov, delegated by the theater workshops to the Petrograd District Court, reported to his comrades in the carpentry. They sent him to trial as a representative of the theatrical local committee from the workshops, and there they tried our artist-performer Klavdy Ippolitovich, locally called Begemotushka, for speculating in antiques on an especially large scale.

All this happened at the beginning of the famous sixties of the last century, in the era of building corn communism and the rapid construction of "Khrushchev" in our glorious city. Then, from high-ceiling communal apartments, many families moved to small-sized, but separate apartments - the dream of the then St. Petersburg humanity.

Antique bulky furniture: cabinets, sideboards, slides, living and dining sets made of oak, walnut, mahogany and Karelian birch, which did not fit in new apartments, were rented out to thrift stores for a penny or taken out in the trash. There was no cheaper antiques anywhere in the world, never and at any time. Dishes, chandeliers, lamps, mirrors, paintings, household items and clothes were also sold for ridiculous money. Few people knew the real value of all these things.

In the 1920s and 1930s, the GEP, NKVD, party workers received apartments of repressed citizens with all the furnishings of the former owners. During the blockade, entire houses in the city died of starvation, and everything that remained in them became the property of janitors, district policemen, house managers and their servants. They themselves and especially their heirs did not understand the intricacies material culture- for them, junk was junk, nothing more. But there were people in the city who understood the value of antiques, who knew how much. Many of them made fortunes on this temporary surprise and literally collected entire museums for a small penny. Our hero Claudius Ippolitovich, the Behemoth, clung to them. It all happened as if by chance, but maybe not.

A little earlier than the sad events of me, a production designer from a small regional theater, was invited as the main artist in the famous city Drama Theater. Having taken office, I, of course, decided to get acquainted with my future master performers and stomped into the yard corner house on Belinsky Street and Liteiny Prospekt, where the art and production workshops of the Leningrad Drama Theater lived in the courtyard wing. I already knew that wonderful theatrical masters worked in them: carpenters, a locksmith, one of the best props in the city - Arkady Zakharovich, who was the captain of the "sea hunter" in the war, and a good, but with cockroaches, as he was certified by me, artist-performer Claudius Ippolitovich, aka Klyaksa-Begemotushka, according to a local unexpected name-calling.

Having familiarized myself with all the carpentry and metalwork masters on the first floor, I went up to the second and, passing through the famous props workshop, found myself in a picturesque hall. Twenty meters away from the entrance, behind a long workbench table, I found a pear-shaped woman of incomprehensible age, without a neck, flabby, with drooping cheeks, resembling a caricature french artist Daumier on King Louis Philippe.

Approaching this aunt closer, I politely asked her:

Tell me, please, where is the artist Klavdy Ippolitovich here?

As where? This is me, Claudius Ippolitovich, - the figure said in a womanish touchy voice, completely inconsistent with the name and patronymic. "What do you want from me, young man?"

From such a surprise, I was dumbfounded and at first I could not immediately explain that I had come on purpose - to get acquainted with him. But later, having learned who I was and where I came from, he suddenly turned to me with some coquetry:

Fu, how young you are, however ... I imagined you more impressive.

I’m sorry, unfortunately, I didn’t come out solid, but I hope I’ll become cloudy over time, ”I answered.

“Yes, it doesn’t pull on “he” - it is it, nothing more.”

Going down to the carpentry, I thought that Claudius, in his appearance, is more in line with the clicks than with the imperial name and the ancient Greek patronymic. Leaving the workshops, he complained to the carpenters about himself, that at first he mistook their Claudius Ippolitovich for a woman.

No, it's not a woman, they have a daughter.

So what, aunts also have daughters.

But they also have a wife, her name is Mamutka, and her daughter Tyutelka. The tyutelka was a success half a head lower than papani, a kind of duchesse pear with legs, - the chief carpenter Vasily Stepanovich explained to me with a certain squint the features of the Behemoth family.

Why are you downgrading it to neuter?

You see, they do not have a male appearance. Not a single hair was born on their fat chin. It doesn’t even seem like a woman to women, but just some kind of hemophodia, God forgive me, ”old Stepanych answered me. - And a woman is not a woman, and a man is not a man. And neither, and what the hell. Don’t even dare cross them: what’s not for them, they immediately fall into hysterics, they squeal like that all day long - like cut boars, they shake out some kind of resentment at everyone, you can even hear it in our carpentry. It is better not to approach them at these moments. Yes, it doesn’t pull on “he” - it is it, nothing more. It does not descend to us, they have nothing to do from their mountain hill in our basement, it is of other blood. For them, we are insects of a rustic spill. And it is a figure hovering in a cloudy fog, raising itself above the bag of life. Their insides cannot stand the sound of the saw, it begins to sway. We are for them - pine shavings, nothing more. Some funny words fall out of their mouths about them ...

What to say? A swollen blob, an ass without a drawstring, a bag with eyes, an emperor of crap, an inflated turkey, an African hippopotamus - everything suits them! - inflamed, exhaled resentment at local artist carpenter-order-bearer Egor Gavrilov.

He is up there, when he goes into a rage, he starts trampling the floor above us, imagining that he is trampling us, - added the theater carpenter Ivan, a Veps, by the way.

Some kind of trouble!

What did they not share, but what should they share? Dramaturgy on the stage of the workshops - the scythe converged with the stone. But I'll have to work with everyone in this trouble.

You do not take our trifles to heart. Klavdy Ippolitovich has great pride, but he is not bad, and a good specialist in your field, ”Vasily Stepanovich reassured me in parting.

In those poor years, people in the workshops organized a clubbing - they cooked and dined in their cage, fenced off from the carpentry room. Products were prepared ahead of time. Potatoes, cabbage, carrots, onions, garlic, cucumbers were brought in early autumn from dachas and villages. Cabbage was pickled in early November. On the weekends of September, we went on a theater bus to the forests of the region for mushrooms.

All food was kept in a well-equipped cold underground right under the stairwell. The wife of the lathe joiner, Gavrilikh, in her official rank, was preparing dinners as a cleaner, a great expert in pickling mushrooms, cabbage, cucumbers and our other delicacies.

Lunch consisted of a good piece of stew, boiled or fried potatoes With sauerkraut, on the table there were always clay bowls with pickles and mushrooms. Portions were served Gulliver, and all this for the then fifty dollars. Fresh meat was supplied from a corner grocery store on Liteiny Prospekt by the butchers themselves, friends of our carpenters. For this, the latter sharpened knives for butchers and treated them to first-class moonshine with sauerkraut.

Claudius the Behemoth was the only one of all the workshop workers who did not participate in artel dinners.

They don’t dine with us, they smell like sauerkraut in our place. Yes, our joiner's wombs produce inhuman sounds from it, which is bad for them. Upstairs they are digesting Mamutka's sweet present with a seagull. Greedy individual type, in a word ... - the turner commented on the absence of the artist in the shop clubbing.

“A swollen blot, an ass without a tsarga, a bag with eyes, an emperor of crap, an inflated turkey, an African hippopotamus - everything suits them!”

So what if he loves sweets, - Gavrilikh defended him. - Claudius Ippolitovich probably has a spoiled stomach for our simple food. And the greedy one is from the blockade, he was starving for a long time. But look, with what pleasure he writes letters for advertising. At this moment, even his tongue sticks out of his mouth and saliva drips.

Indeed, something in my performer was strange and quarrelsome. With his sprawling figure, frozen, pale face, woman's voice and habits, he looked like an eunuch, a eunuch, or the hermaphrodites Mamindya and Papindya, who lived on Buckle in the fifties.

But they do not drink water from the face, it is important that they master the craft and feel the color. At first, of course, I got a lot from him, since he turned out to be an ugly character, corresponding to all the jokes about female logic. What was not according to him - he fell into hysterics and grumbled all day, shaking out resentment from himself. Before new job he broke out, was capricious, was offended by something incomprehensible. He frightened me and himself that he would not succeed, that it was impossible, and not necessary, to fulfill as I wanted. "Do it yourself, if you are sure" - and so on. My attempts to find a peaceful, working way to communicate with him were unsuccessful. In the end, I had to remember the bad, official Stalinist childhood and flog Klavdy Ippolitovich according to all the rules of the multi-story Russian language. Strange as it may seem, he understood this music at once and, looking around at me, obeyed with surprise and fear, recognizing me as the main artist of the theater. Later, after some time, he cautiously asked where I learned such a Russian language, it was painfully hypnotic.

Begemotushka turned out to be a professional artist, he absolutely felt the color, he mastered the drawing, he worked honestly, and I began to treat him with respect.

Before earnings was painfully eager. He made most of his money on advertising, he knew the font perfectly and really wrote it with pleasure, bowing his head and sticking out his tongue. Took a lot of orders from outside. I didn't mind - it's good when a person knows how to earn money. He justified:

I have two large birds on the shelves in my house with open mouths- Mamutka and Tyutelka are sitting, they are demanding food. And here for each letter of money goes according to rates. Everything is legal, just be smart. Look here - ap! - and the letter is ready, twenty kopecks, and to it one more - op! - already forty. From below, the carpenters are jealous that I earn a lot and quickly - let them try. I cope with two jobs - as an artist-performer, and I do all the advertising for the theater. Advertising pays more than painting. But to be honest, I was terribly tired of this job, what else could I find - livelier and more profitable.

One of my first works in the theater was the play "My Mocking Happiness" based on the play by Malyugin. This is a talented work created by correspondence between Anton Pavlovich Chekhov and different people, we decided to make the entourage as authentic as possible, that is, to buy all the furniture, all the details, some of the costumes of the characters from the population of our old city. I have already had a successful experience of this kind in joint work with director Kama Ginkas on the play "The Last" by Maxim Gorky at the Drama and Comedy Theater. Agamirzyan, the director, also invited Ginkas as a co-director of "Mocking", and we decided to continue this fruitful idea.

It was announced on the city radio that the Komissarzhevskaya Drama Theater for the play “My Mocking Happiness” is buying furniture, props, costumes from the population late nineteenth- the beginning of the twentieth century. And literally the next day pandemonium began. The administrators did not have time to write down the addresses and phone numbers of those eager to sell anything to the theater, much more than what we asked for.

In the morning on every appointed Tuesday - the theater's day off - the lobby of the Komissarzhevka was packed huge amount St. Petersburg old women with purses, old suitcases, trunks filled with all sorts of things: candlesticks, ink devices, cigarette cases, pocket watches on chains and without, frames with photographs and just frames, old photo albums with gilded monograms, the remains of porcelain sets, various figurines, umbrellas , stacks, pince-nez, monocles, all kinds of fans, tailcoats, frock coats, hats, top hats, dresses embroidered with beads and glass beads, and so on and so forth.

In short, for me the day off turned into a wild nightmare. Only a few things had to be purchased for the performance, but the old women insisted that I take everything from them, and threatened to bring more paintings, books, kid gloves, mitts, hats, pre-revolutionary playing cards and so on and so forth. In addition to buying props, it was necessary to travel to addresses and select the necessary furniture. Simultaneously with the purchases, it was necessary to monitor the production of scenery, paint materials for costumes and try on costumes for actors.

I obviously could not cope and therefore turned to Klavdii Ippolitovich for help. He saw my sketches, layout, received copies of all the drawings of furniture and props. To my surprise, the Behemoth without hesitation agreed to take on this difficult task of acquiring all the things necessary for the performance.

The theater administrators gave him a whole mountain of addresses of St. Petersburg old women. He began to work on this part very sensibly. I found the necessary furniture in St. Petersburg houses, bought an absolutely Chekhov collection of umbrellas, canes, pince-nez, glasses, and so on.

For more fruitful work, Behemoth has created a whole system. He carefully drew up many sheets of a large barn notebook, where he painted in detail: the name, patronymic, surname of the seller, his address, phone number, what he sells, what time the thing is, from what material, in what condition, the claim for the price. Well, just all personal data. I even felt something was wrong with this too businesslike approach, which is not typical of most artists. But then I forgot; he saved me from this kind of mess that I hate. I was grateful to him at that time.

We released the performance with success, everything turned out great, the scenery aroused great interest. Everyone was satisfied with the work, including Claudius. I forgot about the "ledger" he made with the addresses of the old ladies. The theater no longer needed them. But it turned out that our Behemoth continued to use them and secretly shelled the unfortunate people in the name of the theater, buying unique museum items from them at a low price for their own money. He turned his room in a huge communal apartment on Bolshaya Zelenina Street, on the Petrograd side, into a repository of antiques.

Having filled the room to the point of cramping with the purchased goods, he began to trade gizmos for rich collectors, and he bargained hard with them, not yielding to the appointed price. And from a professional artist he was reforged into an antique "bug", as such figures were called at that time. After some time, the exploits of our Hippo, who did not take into account the laws of the criminal environment, his intransigence and unwillingness to share with the "authorities" did not please the tough bigwigs of the antique market, and they handed him over to the police. They were joined by neighbors in a communal apartment who observed the illegal activities of the artist and were at enmity with him for many years.

The police, who came to the apartment of Klavdy Ippolitovich, found in his room a whole warehouse of expensive museum-level antiques. They took the underground millionaire by the arms, took him to the camp and, putting him in the preliminary room, began to sew a case of speculation on an especially large scale. In that Soviet era, there was a law on speculation, popularly called the "law on underground millionaires", according to which they could be sentenced to a "tower". Hippo, as you know, did not live to see the verdict - he died on the way to him, died of fright.

The deceased is not judged, and whoever remembers the old is out of his sight, - said the foreman of carpenters Vasily Stepanovich after Yegory Gavrilov's report.

Klavdy Ippolitovich was commemorated by all workshops in the carpentry, standing behind a workbench, a new wheat vodka that had just appeared in the shops of the city. Professor Arkady Zakharovich, Marine officer retired, after the third glass, he remembered that the name and patronymic of the deceased - Claudius Ippolitovich - from the Latin-Greek languages ​​\u200b\u200bmeans "lame horse", and "hippopotamus", that is, hippopotamus, from Greek - "water horse" - like that ... After this message, everyone was silent for a long time and thoughtful. In the silence, the cleaning lady suddenly broke through - Gavrilikh:

You can't buy a house for Behemoth. He was inappropriate for us. Build your own, men, the measure sticks out in your eyes. And I will put a candle in Nikol Morskoy in memory of him and pray away your former enmity.

The chief artist of the BDT, Eduard Kochergin, released Notes of a Tablet Rat. Izvestia correspondent Natalia Kurchatova met with the master to discuss the release of his new book and the lengthy renovation of the historical stage.

- Notes of a Tablet Rat is your third book, but in a strange way the first book about the theater to which you have devoted your entire life. Why did it happen?

Theater is hard to write about. How much do you know art books about the theatre? Bulgakov's writings come to mind, and, perhaps, all of them are widely known. I was interested in the theater of people - both inconspicuous people, artisans, but at the same time very important, and those who are in sight, but I wanted to show them from an unexpected point of view. My task was not to stray into theater studies or memoirs, but to give everything the form of living literary stories. It is very difficult, for this you need to have freedom, and what kind of freedom is there when everyone knows and remembers who Evgeny Lebedev, Oleg Borisov, Georgy Tovstonogov are.

Along with stories about legendary people, you write about the actual "tablet rats" - the masters of the production workshop. What kind of temperament do you need to have in order to remain out of sight and not suffer from it in a theater that lives by the attention of the public?

It's not a question of temperament, it's a question of love. As in the chapter "Musician's Azure", where we are talking about Konstantin Bulatov, a wonderful chemist, he could make exactly the paint that was needed according to the artist’s sketch. A person could probably make an impressive scientific career, but he was in love with the theater, and so he labored at the theater.

You describe an episode when Oleg Borisov, in your first joint performance with Tovstonogov, Henry IV, readily accepted an avant-garde costume for that time. Were there episodes when you found a scythe on a stone with the artists?

Of course, not just once. The costumes for the same "Henry IV" were called "aprons" by the artists, and, for example, Efim Kopelyan stubbornly did not want to rehearse in a costume, saying that it was too heavy. To which Tovstonogov told him: “Kochergin’s suit for you, Fima, means it’s heavy. Isn't it hard for you to move your mustache at all the film studios in the country?

Tovstonogov was a man of colossal wisdom and a natural sense of humor, which, by the way, is rarely found among directors. He never yelled at the artists, did not humiliate them, but he could say something that the next day the whole theater would repeat. And if someone wittily parried him, then he himself was the first to laugh.

You have a reputation for being not only witty, but also rather blunt. They retell the story of how you put a bucket on Kame Ginkasu's head.

Oh, this is already a legendary story, although in fact I didn’t put a bucket on his head. I just threw a bucket of that at him with paint on it. Ginkas, by the way, also wrote a book where he mentions this episode.

- Why did you throw it away?

Well, here he is, probably, in detail and tell. I will confine myself to a brief formulation: for egocentrism. Generally speaking, all directors are egocentric, this is such a feature of the director's temperament. But sometimes it's very annoying.

What performances turn out better - those where there is peace and quiet between the director and the artist, or those where there is conflict work?

It happens differently. Sometimes you play giveaway with the director - and everything is fine, and sometimes you quarrel - and that's okay too. But the viewer does not care about this kitchen. What is good theater - the main thing is not what was, but what is.

- Reconstruction of the stage is in full swing, the famous workshops of the theater will also be restored. Do they have anyone to work with?

It is hard to say. At one time, we have been gathering masters for the theater for years. We had the best workshops in the city. All the foreigners who came were amazed at the level of the staging. People of the level of our props Krutova or Boris Smirnov, metal craftsmen, as you understand, do not lie under the fence. Smirnov once made a knight's helmet for Rezo Gabriadze, and he took him to Switzerland to shoot. And he was removed from the plane, because the customs officers decided that he had stolen this helmet from the Hermitage. I had to write to Kirill Lavrov explanatory letters that the helmet is made by our master from the BDT.

- You and Tovstonogov made several dozen performances. Which of them are the most dear to you?

Thirty performances, to be exact. Asking an artist which performance is most dear to him is about the same as asking him what his favorite color is. Each performance is a whole world, including the artistic and staging part. One world ends, another begins. I can only say that we had excellent working relations with Tovstonogov.

- How are your relations with the new artistic director Andrei Moguchiy?

It’s too early to talk about this, the theater is being reconstructed, this is just my field of activity, I accept this Active participation. We'll be done by May, I hope. As soon as it comes to staging, there are some things that I, as an artist, can give to the director. The artist reads the play differently than the director, our categories are somehow more ancient: rhythm, scale and proportion, colors and their effect on the psychology and even the physiology of the viewer.

I can give the director this look if he wants to use it. I have worked with great theater directors in my lifetime - Ravensky, Lyubimov, Tovstonogov, Ginkas, Dodin. I have an established view, and I think the Mighty One understands that trying to somehow bend me and change me is ridiculous. If he needs what I can and can do, then we will work.