Boris Yukhananov on Kirill Serebrennikov

Boris Yukhananov opened the new season at the Stanislavsky Electrotheatre on Septeber 4 with a strong, thoughtful statement about Kirill Serebrennikov and the other "persons of interest" in the Serebrennikov case. I provide a full English translation of his comments below. (I took the photo above at the Electrotheatre in November 2015.)

"I want to begin with a specific and important conversation - about Kirill Serebrennikov. I have three thoughts in connection with this case. First, I have never, for a second, believed in the guilty intent of these unfortunate and afflicted people. I mean every one who has fallen victim to a bad and terrible situation: Alexei Malobrodsky, Nina Maslyaeva, Yury Itin, Yekaterina Voronova and, of course, Kirill. These people are victims of a time, of brute mechanisms of history and fate. I want to emphasize that I am 100% convinced of their total innocence.

What is behind this, what specific political games or Kafkaesque mechanisms of the way governement functions in our day, I do not know and I'm not even going to go into that.

Second, I want to emphasize, and I hope you agree with me, that we, in the theatrical territory, that has always been a whole world within the world, a state within the state, now find ourselves faced by a situation, unfortunately, where we must all show solidarity. In it is hidden the essence of theatre's honor. Insisting on this honor, I want to emphasize that I and the Electrotheatre, declare our solidarity.

There is, as you know, an expression that "there are many truths but only one true truth." I don't know what has happened to this true truth, I don't know what frying pans are frying it these days, but I would amend the expression. I would say, "there are many truths, but only one lie." And the absence of empathy and mercy towards human beings that we see these days is a lie, a terrible lie. That is what I wanted to say about the Kirill Serebrennikov situation."