On May 14, 2013, the Nevsky Avenue. City Sketches Theater Project will start the Seventh International Alexandrinsky Theater Festival. This year, the festival program will be taking place on three stages simultaneously: the Major and Small (7th circle) Stages and the New Stage of the Theater and Cultural Complex. Its inauguration will take place on May 15, 2013. All performances presented that day will be related to various characters of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’ writings. Besides the performances, a vast program will be offered that day to the guests; it will include tours though all buildings, the media center, and stages, as well as lectures and presentations of media projects.

On May 2, 2013, President of Russia Vladimir Putin and Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky visited the Theater/Cultural Complex of “The New Stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater.” Artistic Director of the Alexandrinsky Theater Valery Fokin told about theater’s creative plans and technical capacities of the new unique complex which presently has no analogues in the world. The guests gave a look-over of the new transforming stage with the 300-seat auditorium. The central part of the stage is dynamic: its parts can go up and down composing different geometrical designs, staircases, etc. After that the President visited the media studio: he was shown how with the help of new technologies a video designer can place into a virtual reality an actress performing a pantomime on the background of a green screen (chromakey).

On April 10, 2013, press-conference will take place dedicated to completion of the construction and commissioning of the complex of the New Stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater will take place at the public lobby of the 3rd floor of the theater-cultural complex of the New Stage (#49A Fontanka Emb.) at 12 pm. Press-conference participants, Director of the Alexandrinsky Theater Igor Segedi, Deputy Artistic Director on artistic and production sphere Grigory Popov; Director General of the Zemtsov, Kondiain, and Partners Company Yury Zemtsov; Architect-in-Chief of the Project Nina Popovskaya; Director General of the ETS Construction Company OOO Alexey Morozov, will tell about the new theater complex and application of the newest communication technologies in the sphere of arts.

On March 20 and 21, 2013, H. Ibsen’s performance Hedda Gabler will be performed on the statge of the Moscow TYuZ under the frames of the Russian National Golden Mask Theater Festival. The performance was nominated for the Award in several nominations: “The Best Big-Form Drama Performance;” “The Best Female Role” (Maria Lugovaya as Hedda Gabler); “The Bet Supporting Role” (Yulia Marchenko as Tea Elvsted); “The Best Director’s Job” (Kama Ginkas); “The Best Artist’s Job” (Sergey Barkhin); “The Best Light Designer’s Job” (Gleb Filshtinsky).

On March 4, 2013, the Award Ceremony for prizes of public sympathy took place at the House of Actors (86 Nevsky Ave.); it was organized by the St. Petersburg Theatral (Theater Goers) Society. Statuettes with Pushkin profile were awarded by outcomes of 2012. The recent premiere of the Alexandrinsky Theater, Valery Fokin’s performance The Zero Liturgy after Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novel The Gambler was named among the best performances of 2012; it received the prize of public sympathy with citation “For the vanguard implementation of human passions.”

Yesterday, on March 8, 2013, the Award Ceremony for the Russian National “Figaro” Actor Award took place at the Russian Enterprise Theater named after Andrey Mironov. The list of laureates-2013 included names of Valery Fokin (in the nomination “For servicing the Russian repertory theater”) and People’s Artist of Russia Nina Urgant (in the nomination “For the wonderful life-long instant of time…”). The “Figaro” award was established in 2010 by initiative of the director of the “Russian Enterprise” Rudolf Furmanov; it is awarded for outstanding achievements in the sphere of dramatic art and it also supports young talents.

“The Holiday of the Theater. A.Y. Golovin. To the 150^th Birthday” exhibit opened today at the St. Petersburg Theater Library (#6 Ostrovsky Sq.); it is timed with the jubilee of one of the most outstanding artists of the Russian theater Alexander Yakovlevich Golovin.

On February 8, 2013, the first in this year round table dedicated to the topic “Is Dostoyevsky a Classic Writer or Our Contemporary?” took place at the conference hall of the Alexandrinsky Theater Directorate. On its eve, round table participants watched Valery Fokin’s performance “The Double.” The circle of topics touched in the discussion included issues of modern public’s perception of performances created after Russian classic writings; about the true reading of the classics, and about teaching literature at modern schools.

On February 4, 2013, a creative soiree of young St. Petersburg poets dedicated to the future Nevsky Avenue performancewill take place at the Actors’ Lobby of the Alexandrinsky Theater at 7 p.m. Through the last several months, a Nevsky Avenue Group had functioned in VContakte social network where anybody interested could contribute to creation of the new performance through submitting his/her observations, impressions, stories – true and imaginary, and having placed video clips and photos somehow related with the main city thoroughfare. The poetry brethren You Go, Go, and HOP! organized its own contest of lyrics and prose called You Go, Go, and - Nevsky Avenue. Outcomes of the project will be resumed on February 4.

On February 3, 2013, the main characters of The Fortune performance: Boy Tiltil and Girl Mitil, will get a new Father. Actor Andrey Shimko will play this role for the first time. Earlier, he had been brilliantly playing the role of Bobik, the Green Dog composing funny and witty rhymes. This forced introduction is taking place for a good reason. People’s Artist of Russia Sergey I. Parshin, who had been playing Father, these days is finalizing production of a debut performance: together with People’s Artist of Russia Sergey Migitsko they with play in a tragic comedy A Few Flights of Stairs Up, a non-repertory project of the playwright and director Rodion Ovchinnikov.