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Who finished off ‘Nord-Ost’?
Written by Óëüÿíà ÑÊÎÉÁÅÄÀ   
Âòîðíèê, 06 Ìàé 2003
Ãåîðãèé Âàñèëüåâ ïðîñòî õîòåë ñïàñòè ëþáèìîå äåòèùå.Some believed that reviving the musical is a governmental duty, while others consider it sacrilegious. Either way, the last performance is May 10th.
 
The audience voted with their feet.
 
On the morning of October 26th, I winced when I heard them say on TV that the terrorists were no more, but the show would go on, and in the same building as before. How could they put it on in that theater? How could they DANCE there, where people in the throes of death gave up their souls to God?
 
Later there were cheers and patriotic articles in the papers about how this would be our reply to the terrorists, that we would not bow our heads and so forth. So I hesitated. I am, in general, someone who is easily swayed.
 
Later still, there was this press conference, and the show's producers, Georgy Vasiliev and Alexei Ivashchenko (the legendary ‘Ivasi’ duo), reported that the revived ‘Nord-Ost’ had failed miserably.
 
In March, the ticket sales were half, when compared with the October ‘pre-terrorist attack’ sales (only a third of the seats were sold). The play can only survive on what it earns, since it is a commercial enterprise. It was bad enough that before the terrorist attack it was not on long enough to break even: when they conceived the musical, they had to borrow start-up capital. Now there was nothing, with which to pay the show’s debts.
 
Last October, the musical became the most famous show in the world, but by March it was unprofitable, and because of this it is to close. May 10th will be its last performance.
 
How it rose from the grave
 
The first shock is that it is a ‘commercial enterprise’. If this were to be ‘our answer to the terrorists’, would this not mean that we could assume that its revival was a government matter? And that money was to be allocated from the state?
 
“We’re very grateful to the government,” said producer Georgy Vasiliev quietly, “for its help in paying our employees’ salaries during the recovery period… Had it not been for this, in December we’d have been down to nothing.”
 
The Russian federal government allocated thirteen and a half million rubles (about $500 thousand) to ‘Nord-Ost’. Not for the revival of the musical, however, but so that the performers did not die of hunger. Before this, according to some sources, the ‘Nord-Ost’ players had been two months without a penny.
 
The Moscow mayor’s office paid to have the damaged theater repaired, and after this state involvement in the fate of the play virtually ceased. The damage to ‘Nord-Ost’ (the bullet-riddled scenery and the notorious orchestra pit) was equal to twenty-three million rubles (about $800 thousand). The Ministry of Culture allocated three million (about $100 thousand), and Vasiliev had to raise the remaining money on his own.
 
Georgy Leonardovich (Vasiliev) will not discuss how went about with outstretched palm. He gratefully lists those who allocated aid, but makes no mention of those who mocked or deceived him. Apparently there were some who did just that.
 
In an interview on the TV program ‘Itogi’ (November 29th, 2002), Vasiliev said: “According to preliminary estimates, 15 to 25 million rubles will be required to repair all the damage. Unfortunately, we don’t have this money yet. At first we thought we’d have it in time to start work in January, but it seems that we won’t be able to in January, because the promised funding is held up.”
 
Actress Yekaterina Guseva, in an interview with the newspaper ‘Novaya Gazeta’ (December 26th, 2002), said: “We must revive it in defiance of all who at first shouted ‘we will help you, we will help you’ and now hide in the bushes.”
 
You can imagine what condition yesterday’s hostage, Vasiliev, is in, since, after all, when the actors left the auditorium, everyone was shouting that they were heroes.
 
The heroes are manically afraid to enter the auditorium. Even in other theaters, they sang with a lump in their throat. For two months, the head of the children’s troupe was afraid to see his wards, the children with whom he sat in captivity. He could not bring himself to go to them.
 
I tried to
 
The second premiere of ‘Nord-Ost’ was on February 8.
 
“For the premiere we accredited 400 journalists and 60 television cameras,” says Georgy Leonardovich. “After the performance, the applause went on for 15 minutes. But later they wrote… about a putrid smell… about how it was like dancing on graves. Ninety-five percent of the articles were not about the play, but about the events in October. Prior to the articles, in January, tickets were selling very well…” Georgy Leonardovich falls silent.
 
“For three months we were digging ourselves out of this grave… But the journalists sent us back into it.”
 
Keenly feeling my own guilt and shame, I flip through my binder. Here it is, my report on the premiere (‘Komsomolskaya Pravda’, February 10th, 2003): “This is where Movsar Barayev lay dead embracing a bottle of Hennessey… Here is where the terrorist women were sitting, and over there, the bomb… In the front row a woman and a young man stand petrified: This hurts, she cries. It hurts a lot. Right here they shot the girl…” So, clearly, THIS MEANS THAT WE ARE ALSO RESPONSIBLE FOR THE DEATH OF ‘NORD-OST’?
 
To understand the situation, I went to the show. Alone: my husband and all my friends refused to go.
 
What happened next? Please believe me, I am not a coward, and by the nature of my work I end up in some extreme situations, but despite this, halfway to the theater I got a little hysterical. I realized I did not want to go to the show, but to head home and hide under my bed and lie there and whine in a high-pitched voice (I am literally conveying the thoughts I had back).
 
I went and sat in the theater hall with a twisted expression. Nearby sat an amused child of about ten years of age: “Mom, where were the suicide bombers sitting? Mom, when they captured ‘Nord-Ost’, did they have opera glasses and programs too?” I will not repeat what the people said as they walked past the orchestra pit.
 
Perhaps the actors feel differently?
 
Every day, at least one of the artists in the musical would admit that when they enter the auditorium, they relive the horror all over again: “We thought that time healed, but it doesn’t heal a thing. The play is clearly divided into two parts: before the pilots (when the terrorists burst on stage), and after the pilots. Every time that moment comes, I start frantically looking to the exits, TO SEE IF ANYONE IN THE AUDIENCE IS WALKING AROUND…”
 
The actor’s face is every bit as twisted as my own.
 
Thus it is proven: the press could not have written anything else, despite an offended Vasiliev, because it wrote the truth.
 
“They left us no choice”
 
Who could have predicted that the bloody show arranged by the terrorists in October would be more powerful and more vivid than the musical creation of ‘Ivasi’? And that Kaverin’s tale of love would in the future be only associated with a bottle of Hennessy?
 
Back in December, when the revival was still underway, the managers of the musical received the results of an opinion poll. Fifty-four percent of the audience that had been planning on seeing ‘Nord-Ost’ before the terrorist attack now said that they would not go.
 
“We were hoping to break through all that,” said Vasiliev.
 
Trying to separate the musical from the terrorist attack, the producers launched a clumsy propaganda campaign. They insisted that everything had been swept away, cleaned up, and replaced. As you can see, this did not achieve results.
 
Yes, and it grievously insulted relatives of the slain hostages. In November, giving their nodding support to a revival of the play, they had expected that ‘Nord-Ost’ would find room for a memorial with photos, and that the performances would begin with a moment of silence.
 
There was nothing of the sort, and now, whenever family members talk about the musical, there is freezing hatred in their eyes.
 
Tatiana Karpova, mother of the deceased bard Alexander Karpov: “We found the strength to come to the premiere, but there on the wall, instead of a list of our children’s names, was a list of sponsors.”
 
Many understood that the musical NEEDED to avoid any signs of a memorial. Had they done it any differently, what few spectators remained might run off. But understanding does not mean forgiving.
 
“Georgy Leonardovich,” I ask Vasiliev. “You did realize that having the musical in this building would lead to problems? Why did you decide to revive it here?”
 
Georgy Leonardovich is surprised.
 
“I didn’t make the decision. I was lying unconscious in the hospital, and the Moscow authorities two hours after the attack said that the musical was to be reopened and in the same building. I got out of the hospital, and they’d already started repairing the theatrical center.”
 
In Vasiliev’s interview with radio ‘Echo of Moscow’ (aired November 1st, 2002), he said: “They just told me that ‘Nord-Ost’ would start soon in the same place, and in general they didn’t ask us. I’d like to say that at least for the sake of decency they could have contacted us…”
 
“Of course, for us it was a chance to survive, but to go back to that same building… But the choice was either to go back, or close for good… There was no money to move somewhere else, while I also understand that the government (Vasiliev grins sadly) back then had to ‘reply to the terrorists’. They practically left us with no choice.”
 
Government question
 
Had it wished, the state could have saved ‘Nord-Ost’.
 
They did not have to wipe away all traces of the attack. In principal, they could simply not sell tickets to seats in which sat the slain spectators. Leave the bullet holes. In the Soviet Union, in places where the largest tragedies took place, they built memorials. At Khatyn, for example. Certainly, no one would willingly go to such a ‘Nord-Ost’, but people never do go to such memorials on their own: they go in organized groups, on buses, for the patriotic education of the young.
 
Former ‘Nord-Ost’ producer Alexander Tsekalo told me of another idea. On the second day of the capture, when he was standing around outside Dubrovka, soaked in the rain, a friend of his, political consultant Alexei Sitnikov, came to the (hostage rescue) headquarters. All night long they walked around the guard posts. Sitnikov proposed that they make ‘Nord-Ost’ a worldwide performance. It would travel to various countries, giving concerts, and sell VERY expensive tickets, and leave the play untranslated. ‘Nord-Ost’ could be Russia’s business card, while the apotheosis of the idea would be to have a show in New York City on September 11th.
 
After the rescue of the theatrical center, Tsekalo tried to bring this crazy beauty of a project to life. He got with members of the federal parliament, but it was already the third reading of the budget and no one would consider sponsoring funding.
 
“I started thinking,” says Alexander Yevgenievich (Tsekalo). “What about the government money for national publicity? Don’t we really care what the ‘Daily Post’ writes about our President? The idea was: if there is a clause in the budget, we could simply insert our project there. But the MPs said there is no such clause.”
 
When ‘Nord-Ost’ received bad press, Vasiliev came to the newspaper’s editorial offices. “Why?” he asked. “Why couldn’t you have written this differently? Write that we held out, that we won, that we were able to do it?”
 
I am forwarding this question to the government. Kaverin’s fine novel is something on which an entire generation was raised. The beautiful musical was the best in Russia. We were proud of it, and took foreigners to see it. Why not turn its revival into a symbol of our victory over terrorism, of good over evil? Why did they force the musical to use the building in which it had been condemned to death?
 
“Because they screwed up royally”
 
“Because they screwed up royally,” said the father of slain hostage Sergey Karpov. “They let the terrorists get to Moscow, and killed over a hundred people. Is this something to be proud of? Where’s the victory over terrorism here?”
 
“I have the impression,” said one of the managers of the musical, “that we were revived just to let us quietly die.”
 
There is a nasty story with the hostages, whom no one wants to compensate. There is a nasty fact, that 80 percent, according to some accounts, are disabled and HAVE NO BENEFITS allowing them treatment where they live. There is a nasty story that the terrorist attack on ‘Nord-Ost’ has not been recognized as a force majeure (an act of God or other unforeseen event that cancels contractual obligations – ed). Producer Vasilyev asked the owners of the theater, the bearing plant, to excuse them from rent during the reconstruction period. “Certainly!” they said at the factory. “It was an extraordinary event!” The revenue service, however, demanded taxes on the rent, and did not want to hear about any force majeure, so Vasilyev had to pay.
 
“Everything is being done,” say the hostages, “to make it look like there never was a terrorist attack, and that nobody died here.”
 
Six months after the deaths of the hostages, Dmitry Milovidov, the father of deceased 14-year-old Nina, planted a wooden cross in the lawn in front of the theatrical center.
 
Curse
 
Mikhail Vinogradov is a psychiatrist with thirty years experience. He was the head of the Interior Ministry’s research center, and developed the first prototype of a ‘terrorist sleeping gas’ such as was used at Dubrovka. He headed the Soviet Union’s first unit for provision of medical assistance during major disasters. No one understands the psychology of the ‘Nord-Ost’ nightmare better than this expert in catastrophes.
 
“What’s to understand?” asks Mikhail Viktorovich (Vinogradov). “Everything is clear with ‘Nord-Ost’. The fact is, negative mental energy, HORROR felt by people dying a violent death, will always remain at the scene of a tragedy. At places of mass murder it almost never disappears. Subconsciously, everyone knows this, and so they are afraid to go to ‘Nord-Ost’. And rightly so: one can’t spend any time in the resulting ‘chunk’ of horrors without some effect. Some might get stomach ulcers, some might go mad…”
 
According to Vinogradov, the man who decided to revive this show was amoral. He harmed the living and abused the dead. Vasiliev simply went along with it all, since he wanted to keep his offspring alive. Unscrupulous officials filled his head with nonsense. The psychiatrist has no consolation for Vasiliev: the musical is dead. It died the moment the terrorists entered the hall.
 
“This mortal dread that hangs over the theatrical center could also be called a curse. It hangs over the building, and the play, and the performers. No matter where ‘Nord-Ost’ would move to, the curse would follow. Now they are thinking about a road show. They will fail.”
 
Maybe I would ignore this psychiatrist, had it not been for one circumstance: when Vasiliev asked for the renovated theatrical center to be consecrated, the (Russian Orthodox) Patriarchate refused to do so.
 
Black PR
 
If only you could know how I pity them. Vasilyev and Ivashchenko spent 20 years hatching this musical, and caressed as a loving child. The raised a ‘Nord-Ost’ flag at the North Pole. At the one hundredth performance, they released a hundred paper airplanes on stage.
 
Vasiliev announced to his actors that ‘Nord-Ost’ would close before their trip to St. Petersburg for ‘Golden Mask’. The guys had been waiting a long time for ‘Golden Mask’, and did not get any sleep the night before because of the excitement. It was probably a gesture of despair on Georgy Leonardovich’s part. They say that he did everything he could to save the play. He was everywhere, and begged everyone.
 
The play in St. Petersburg turned out to be about two ‘masks’, and the holiday was ruined.
 
“There was so much negative PR,” Tsekalo told me sadly. “No project ever got it this bad, not ever.”
 
There was, however, a similar story. In 1991, singer Igor Talkov was gunned down, and for the first two weeks they thought the killer was Igor Malakhov, the bodyguard of the singer Aziza. It was discovered later that someone else committed the murder, but Aziza’s career was already over. Igor Krutoy later said about Talkov and Aziza: “One bullet killed two people.”
 
What a bright and talented singer she was… And what a bright and talented play was ‘Nord-Ost’.
 
By Ulyana SKOYBEDA
May 6th, 2003
In ‘Komsomolskaya Pravda’
 

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