Click the image to see the proram!
Watch the recording of the play here!
“Dragon” is a parable devoted to Putin and Putin’s Russia based on Yevgenii Shvarts’ cult drama. “Put-in,” a three-headed, oil-drinking dragon, is venerated by the city because he protects it from other dragons. Each year, a girl is sent to his palace, and afterward no one hears from her again. The event is marked by a celebration involving the girl, her family, and the general populace. One day, a knight-errant Lancelot arrives in the city. A descendant of King Arthur’s knight and a distant relative of St. George, Lancelot falls in love with the “celebrated” girl, a teenage gymnast and challenges the dragon…
Notes from the director and writer Julia Nemirovskaya:
“Russia’s civil society is now represented by the white ribbon bearers who took part in the anti-government manifestations that overtook Moscow in 2011-12. They are mostly young people, middle class and intellectuals — not impoverished lumpens. They do not claim to be the 99%. They just demand that the government of thugs and thieves, along with their KGB style management, go away and take with them the unbelievable inequality and proverbial corruption. They want laws to be reinforced and the civil society built. But numerous questions remain. Is it a rightful thing for the wealthy and educated to stage an uprising in a country where the majority is like the man they fight? …Yet [our] Dragon is not just mean: he falls in love, sympathizes with Lancelot, and he is given probably the most important line in the whole play: “я что-то забыл сказать… ах да! НЕ БОЙТЕСЬ!” [There is something I forgot to say… Ah, yes! DO NOT BE AFRAID!]