In my adolescence, in the first years of my growth, I had a hobby: I collected the autographs of stars who came to our Tyumen. My girlfriends and I used to wait for them at the back entrance of the Philharmonic, at the airport, under the windows of hotels, and often went to concerts. Whenever I could, I always asked what singers like to read. Our pop stars alike replied that their favorite book is The Master and Margarita. And all the glossy magazines were filled with various interviews and polls, in which he talked about his favorite books of pop music: either this or Carlos Castaneda’s book. Which, the stars did not specify. They did not know that there was more than one book about don Juan.
Then at the age of 12-14 I realized that this was not quite normal. First of all, it can’t be a favorite book for someone who reads a lot – and I read a lot too. In this, I soon finally established myself, got a diploma in literary criticism and realized that for Bulgakov fashion was not the fruit of enthusiasm for returned literature – only the stars did not read much. Bulgakov was at the trial. And of course, people of the demimonde, read it to keep the conversation going.
The author was fashionable, what can I say. And it’s readable. His novel is a rare book read by most people with higher education in those years.
And now? Everything seems to be now. Gone are the days of a favorite book. How else to explain the extremely bold movie based on The Master and Margarita that was announced to us yesterday? After long troubles, frosts and director changes, the movie will be released on January 25th.
The budget was wildly announced – 800 million rubles at the initial stage. Like Cheburashka. True, it was under the ex-director Nikolai Lebedev, who eventually left the project. But this amount was called five years ago. During the trip, the dog may growl. As of March and the new director Mikhail Lokshin, the budget of the tape is 1.2 billion rubles. Probably eight hundred just gave the Cinema Fund. I would not be surprised if a state billion was invested in a masterpiece with Yevgeny Tsyganov.
Will there be a new “Cheburashka”? Theoretically, it looks like yes. Master and Margarita are to adults what Gena the crocodile is to children.
But there is a difference: The masses have never read the novel. Yes, and I had a suspicion that it was no longer the masses that allowed him to pass. At first, the novel was respected by everyone, but was not read due to inaccessibility. Then everyone read or pretended to read. Now, it seems that very few of the new generations read The Master and Margarita and won’t even pretend to.
It seems to me that this fact – the fact that the novel ceased to be a cult – untied the hands of the most extravagant experiments on it. What was there before? All of the author’s guts in previous adaptations had to do with the extent of Margarita’s nudity at Woland’s ball. There are no shocking scenes, everything is traditional, close to the text. Sometimes it is very traditional.
A lot of information – a lot of sadness. Remember how Vladimir Bortko was openly suspected of plagiarism: “The Heart of a Dog” turned out to be very similar to the Italian adaptation of the story directed by Alberto Lattuada? Then everyone rushed to look and was unpleasantly surprised: After all, it looks confusing!
You are falling now. When I started to write this text, I watched Maciej Wojtyshko’s four-part Polish production The Master and Margarita, which is little known in our country. And what would you think? 127 minutes longer. There are a few more differences, and by the way it’s 1988. But that’s it, it’s a temporary feeling…
As for the new movie, it’s very bold. Judging by the trailer, wow. First of all, there’s a heap with a mix of three boxes of magic realism and worlds in vogue at the moment: falling under purges and bans, the author sits down to write a new novel about Woland, whose prototype is an outsider. met, and then everything started to turn: a war with NKVD shniks, a mini black singer, the aesthetics of pre-war Berlin, German freaks from Rammstein’s productions, like in the movie “Mephisto” … And in the center of it all, “Everyone Evgeny Tsyganov, a great actor who is the same everywhere in the cinema, except for the movie “The Man Who Surprised”, rises. And it’s the same with interviews. It’s more diverse in the theater, but it doesn’t matter: I looked at The Master from the trailer and I absolutely did not understand whether he was the director of last year’s performance of “Mozart’s Don Juan.” Dress rehearsal” or Borya from Odessa is caught between a 15-year-old schoolgirl and cholera.
Good actor, handsome. How much can you do? He has such a performance characteristic: as the grandfather of Ivan the Terrible, as his son, a chauffeur from the OZ Country under butyrates, black marketer Yan Rokotov . Everything stayed with him, everyone was forgiven for a languid look. But Master? This is sacred to a post-Soviet person! It’s a taboo! Moreover, an actor whose face does not change is accompanied by a wife with the same data: Yulia Snigir in the role of Margarita, I honestly thought that this was Chaliapin’s wife: there was a TV show recently. And a face! And facial expressions!
The plot is stunning, the actors are trendy, the faces are stone…
What about taboo? Or is it no more? Now that the millions of people who read the novel for vanity and the biography for a tic are exhausted, can the rest force anything? Variations on a theme. Now you can run away in such a way, show yourself to the director in such a way that everyone immediately understands: how stupid Bulgakov was, he did not think to finish it! The little writer was weak, or that’s the point!
Yes, we realized that Bulgakov didn’t screw everything up. He stood in such a garden of time, nervous, flew away, you understand. But now you’re screwing up. Fortunately, very few readers remain. Of course they do at school, but I haven’t heard in a long time that such great books are read by anyone other than those who passed the literature exam in the eleventh grade.
I suddenly thought we had a whole wave of movie adaptations for those who haven’t read it. Sort of like a “Rethinking the Classics” title. Two years ago there was “Pushkin’s Tales. Now that a foreign agent, Mikhail Zygar (For Adults, who is recognized as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation), God forgive me (I don’t know if I should mention this regarding the creation of the series that scared the audience so much). There’s sex, scum, thugs, werewolf colonels and everything is so trendy. And of course the director’s future husband. Everything fashionable is made by families at once, how else?
Do you remember Dead Souls 2020? Wow! Chichikov comes from Moscow in an expensive car, the weed-smoking Manilov, the seductive Korobochka, the jug-nosed official from the Ministry of Culture – all vying for places in a privileged Moscow cemetery … By the way, Chichikov, we are familiar. Evgeny Tsyganov. So how? Good actor. You can call it my favourite, yes! Fine, dammit! What about the face? I played Ivan III twice, watching the trailer for Bulgakov – it feels like the tsar is being tortured in the NKVD – well, a face!
Do we have Gogol or Bulgakov? Chichikov or where? Why, judging by the trailer, instead of Saltychikha Margarita? Why did he drop a billion? A German star of Tarantino was called for the role of Woland. Consider a fee. Don’t we have players for that kind of money? No, what are you, I am not a leavened patriot, but you are looking for something. Is it time to spend public money on German players? What is this gesture of goodwill? Why are we paying from the treasury for a Bastard Gang star at a time like this? Meanwhile, Mr. August Diehl got a taste and apparently re-directed himself to Russian cinema: now Dr. He will play Mengele with Kirill Serebrenikov, he is already starting filming.
Super! We are at the forefront of culture, world stars are with us. But why our, damn it, for our money and under the Bulgakov banner?
You don’t think, I’m not a retrograde. I saw such films, went to such festivals – not everyone can stand it, so sometimes they cunningly wrapped everything! But I don’t understand where the billion is going here. More than enough! Why did he go there? I understand that Evgeny Tsyganov has many children. I don’t remember exactly how many, but it occurred to me that there were too many. Here without question.
But why not shoot something else for that billion+? Yes, and it’s cheaper.
I read in the foreign press that the film “started to become one of Russia’s biggest blockbusters in recent years” – for example, it has to be the loudest Russian blockbuster of recent years.
And next – about co-producer Leonid Blavatnik: “An English-American tycoon and an enthusiastic patron of Russian independent filmmaking” – an Anglo-American tycoon and enthusiastic patron of Russian independent cinema.
So I don’t understand? The Cinema Fund first allocated 500 million rubles for the film, and in 2022 the creators asked for another three hundred rubles. And here Mr. Blavatnik, movie magnate? And why will the movie break box office records? Over a billion has been dropped for whom overall? The actor is German, the songs are in English, the fancier, as it turned out, is English. Our only Gypsies, our money and our “Bulgakov” sign.
I watched the trailer and I absolutely did not understand what the last one had to do with it. They would make up a beautiful story in the spirit of their magical realism. After eight hundred million, only ears remained from Cheburashka, but they brought three billion!
What about Bulgakov? Readers of the novel will not understand why his name is stuck in between.
For those who haven’t read it… Are you sure it will be interesting for them to look at these mental exercises? I suspect.
And I want to agree on the shore: what if the movie fails? The movie “Breath”, which worried everyone about the pandemic and doctors, did not even collect a hundred million. “The Challenge” raised almost two billion, but for this the actor and director had to sit on a rocket and hang out in space for two weeks. By the way, the budget of the movie was less than the budget of The Master and Margarita – a billion. Along with this rocket flight. There are no questions for the actor and director: they flew, got the money back, we looked into space for 300 rubles.
And if Master and Margarita fails, will there be a landing? Before defrauding a billion, Yulia Peresild wrote a will: Dangerous work for a billion, you can burn in a rocket.
Does the Tsyganov-Snigir family write orders? But what if the movie fails? To be fair, they would go to court for that kind of money along with the director and producer in case of failure.
Over a billion! This is crazy! Who and what do we want to show with this money? To show the world Yevgeny Tsyganov? It’s about time.
The author expresses his personal opinion, which may not coincide with the editors’ position.