In the first years after Russia launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine, Timofey Kuljabin staged several classic war-themed plays in a short period of time. Since February 2022, he has staged Shakespeare's "Macbeth" in Frankfurt, Brecht's "The Fear and Misery of the Third Reich" in Tallinn and Euripides' "Iphigenia in Aulis" in Athens - all with obvious connections to today's ongoing wars, mass killings and occupations.
But when I meet him at the Hippodrome in Malmö, he is not rehearsing a play with a direct connection to today's world conflicts, but a play about family battles with ingredients of shameful diseases, incest and euthanasia.
- Everything has its time. After the war has been going on for almost five years, I have returned to psychological dramas, such as Ibsen's, he says.
Most recently it was "Nora" ("A Doll's House") in Bulgaria and Japan, one of four Ibsen plays he has directed in recent years.
Ibsen's work is usually dismissed by some critics as a bit dated. What do you see in a play of his?
- It depends on which one you are referring to. He wrote so many plays, some may have become outdated, but many are still modern. "Gengångere" is a very special play, which was initially banned because it touched on a number of sharp social issues such as incest, euthanasia and the role of the church.
It is perhaps one of Ibsen's most complicated plays for a director to tackle, and try to do it in a contemporary way
- On the other hand, it is a very poetic work, with a complex language, which touches on many important topics, but they are not clearly stated but are in the air. So it's an interesting combination of poetry, big social and intimate issues – like mother-son relationships. It is perhaps one of Ibsen's most complicated plays for a director to tackle, and try to do so in a contemporary way.
What does "Gengångere" have to say to today's audience?
- At the center is euthanasia, which is still a difficult and complicated issue. At the same time, I am looking for a new way to tell the story. Our production does not follow exactly how Ibsen's original play is written, but it is our own story that begins two days after what takes place in it. So it is a reconstruction, or deconstruction, of the original events. It gives us space and distance to look at the events from a different perspective.
In the theater's program, the performance is presented as "free after Henrik Ibsen's play". However, Kuljabin emphasizes that it is essentially Ibsen's text, with some shortenings and adaptations in the script that he has created together with the dramatist Roman Dolzjanskij.
- We have simplified the old-fashioned language somewhat, so that it is clearer to a modern ear.
He does not see any direct relationship between this staging and his own situation as an emigrant from Russia.
- No, this is a drama that very carefully treats the relationships in a family, between mother and son. Ibsen as he is.
Timofey Kuljabin was forced to leave his homeland after he publicly distanced himself from Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The protest also led to the halting of all his productions in Russia, including the opera "Don Pasquale" at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow. He was not the only one to be blacklisted: the ballet "Nureyev" by Kirill Serebrennikov, another war opponent, was also shut down.
But I'm not complaining, but happy to be able to work all over the world. I like to travel and see new places
- It is part of the system in Russia, the simple rule is that anyone who says something against the government is out of the game. But I'm not complaining, but happy to be able to work all over the world. I like to travel and see new places, different cultures, different actors, it's very fruitful.
Today, Kuljabin is based in Berlin and takes over this autumn as one of the artistic directors at the Staatstheater Cottbus.
When I ask how life in exile has affected his creation, he replies: "not so much". He has long been a diligent international director. But he does not want to be associated with the term "exile".
- I am not in exile, but rather relocated. It's a new chapter in life. I'm not a nostalgic person, I don't long for home and I don't consider it so tragic. I have many of my friends and colleagues around me, and the team I worked with for many years has also left Russia.
A large part of the Russian theater world and the rest of the so-called intelligentsia – journalists, lawyers and others – have emigrated. He does not know how it has affected Russia, other than that it must be harmful to society that so many have left.
- I haven't been to Russia in five years and don't have a clear picture of it from the inside. I no longer follow Russian theater life, so I don't know if anything of quality is being done there. Lots of talented people have emigrated and they are successful in the new reality.
Will you ever return to Russia?
- It's not something I'm thinking about now, but you should never say never. It could happen, although I don't see it in the near future.
Russia's name has been tarnished because of the war of aggression against Ukraine. Have you yourself been subjected to negative reactions because you are Russian?
- No, not personally. In the theaters I have worked in, in Sweden, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and France, no one has asked me to show my passport. When speaking the language of the theatre, nationality or skin color does not matter.
Could it be because you are known to be opposed to the war?
- Yes, maybe it is.
When asked how he sees the future of the Putin regime, he answers:
- Every regime has an end, especially totalitarian ones. But I cannot predict when or how it will happen. There are so many things that have occurred that have been unexpected and inexplicable.
His schedule for the coming years is full, and he looks forward to being able to devote himself to opera as well. He sees Scandinavia as interesting, and negotiations are underway with a theater in Norway.
But right now he is focused on the set in Malmö, his first in Sweden.
Timofey Kuljabin looks out over the Hippodrome, the magnificent former circus hall that has over 19 meters up to the roof dome.
- I hope it will work, that it is a modern version that maintains the basic spirit of the original work and is visually strong.
