* On February 22, 23 and 24 the performance will be simultaneously interpreted into English

On February 22, 23 and 24, 2019 the premiere of ‘Stalin. The Genesis’ by Valery Fokin will take place at the Main Stage of the Alexandrinsky Theatre.

The years of Stalin’s power and his personality are among Russian history’s most tough, tragic and grievous issues, still breaking the Russian society up. However, every tragedy has its origin and that is what theatrical art seeks. ‘Stalin. The Genesis’ is a fable of spiritual and moral transformation of young revolutionary Joseph Jughashvili into totalitarian ruler, a story of how human dies and tyrant is born.

Valery Fokin: ‘The idea first came to my mind about three years ago. I wanted to follow the process of how Stalin simultaneously and inevitably overcame Jughashvili within one personality. Did you know that Stalin resolutely denied all his childhood stories? This is his bio’s black hole and it captured my attention. I started to investigate and became particularly interested in his young adulthood period, before Siberian exile. The truth is that Stalin’s bio is full of illogical and even incredible facts. The plot is not a direct storyline of documents and facts, as it is in the nature of theatre to extrapolate and rethink. The utmost mystical fact of Stalin’s life is that the very man became the leader of the country.’

The production is based on recently discovered archives, fiction literature extracts, both contemporary and classical: versions of Mikhail Bulgakov’s play ‘Batum’ and Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel ‘Demons’ are among them too.

Our aim is to comprehend life cases, peculiar traits of former seminarian and revolutionary romantic’s character as well as personality that drove him to become such a grievous historic figure. What is even more importance – to explore the common path of human soul’s transformation and societies’ major seductions.

Vladimir Koshevoy will perform the role of young Joseph Jughashvili. People's Artist of Russia, Awardee of the USSR and Russia State Prizes Pyotr Semak will perform mature Stalin.