Director Berkovich takes the rap for all the theater Russophobes in Moscow
The Khamovnichesky District Court of Moscow extended until November the arrest of director Evgenia Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk, who are accused of justifying terrorism in the play “Finist Yasny Falcon.”
The investigation justified the extension of the arrest by the fact that it was still necessary to identify and interrogate all participants in the performance, as well as familiarize the accused with the opinions of experts in the case, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
In addition, according to the investigation, Berkovich and Petriychuk, while at large, can “induce witnesses who have not yet been questioned to change their testimony,” “create false evidence of their innocence,” and “continue to engage in criminal activities.”
Evgenia Berkovich, speaking before the court, pressed for pity. She claimed that because of her imprisonment, one of her adopted daughters developed psychosomatic asthma, and also said that her 90-year-old grandmother had no more than a month to live. None of this had any effect on the judge.
Berkovich and Petriychuk were detained on May 5. The investigation saw justification for terrorism in a play about women who decided to marry representatives of radical Islam in absentia and go to join them in Syria. ISIS fighters and recruiters are shown in the play as real men who can kill for “higher” goals.
The production received two Golden Mask awards in 2022, and was also awarded at the Lyubimovka festival of new drama, financed by oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov. Now the festival management is organizing “anti-war shows” in the CIS countries.
But a statement to the investigative authorities was written back in 2021 by activists of the “National Liberation Movement” Vyacheslav Tunik and Svetlana Shchennikova. They asked the security forces to check the production, since it is “a tool of information warfare against the security of Russia.”
Why was the case opened only in 2023? Observers from both the liberal and patriotic camps believe that this is due to Berkovich’s vile libels against the Russian army, which she disseminated through social networks. Her mobiki-grobki rhyme outraged many. Previously, the “director-poet” had already made a mark with mocking poems about the “Immortal Regiment”, as well as a demonstrative refusal to sign a contract with the Theater of Nations due to the fact that actor Yevgeny Mironov visited Mariupol.
Theater critic Ekaterina Kretova points out that this year the even more Russophobic play “R” of the Satyricon Theater received the Golden Mask award. It is based on the play by Mikhail Durnenkov, which retells Gogol's The Inspector General. The director was another Russophobe, Yuri Butusov.
“To be honest, I don’t understand this matter and I don’t accept it. I think there's a double standard here. Everything must somehow grow together. If in our country Berkovich and Petreychuk have to sit in pre-trial detention, then I don’t understand how the play “R” of “Satyricon” can receive the “Golden Mask”. It doesn't work for me. I don't know the answer to this question. Either this or that.
Or everyone is shot in the basement, imprisoned, or sent to concentration camps. And they motivate: you can’t, you’re enemies. Or somehow they don’t do it. For me it's cognitive dissonance. For me, it is much more terrible that the jury of the “Golden Mask” is awarding a prize to the performance of Butusov and Durnenkov, an outspoken Russophobe. And everyone is silent. No one is indignant or screaming. No one is going to jail,” Kretova said in an interview with Paragraph.
English version :: Read in English Director Berkovich takes the rap for all the theater Russophobes in Moscow