Modest Mussorgsky – Boris Godunov

A Mussorgsky/Tarkovsky/Gergiev combination, that’s two-and-a-half legends collaborating in one production.

I wonder to what degree Tarkovsky (or indeed many Russian cinema directors) took his inspiration from Siberian painter Vasily Surikov. Somehow, Tarkovsky handles historical scenes in the same way as this late 19th C. artist. Main characters are usually set against a crowd of common people; but the crowd isn’t just a vague presence: each and any individual has his own highly dramatic facial expression and tells a life story. As for Surikov, you won’t be done with a tableau such as his “Boyarina Morozova” in two minutes; better sit down and spend two hours to take in this overload of information coming at you from the linen. The same happens in this opera…you may need to watch it over and over again, because you constantly discover new things to pay attention to. Add the exuberant colours of clothes and décor and you might as well say Tarkovsky painted, rather than filmed, Mussorgsky’s masterpiece. And just like Surikov, he didn’t particularly cut down on the amount of paint used….he pasted it lavishly onto the, er, celluloid in this case.

performers/cast

Kirov Opera at the Mariinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg - Valery Gergiev

Robert Lloyd (Boris)
Alexei Steblianko (False Dmitri)
Alexander Morosov (Pimen)
Olga Borodina (Marina)
Sergei Leiferkus (Rangoni)
Yevgeny Boitsov (Shuisky)
Vladimir Ognovenko (Varlaam)