There was a time when Serebrennikov benefited from the system that finally turned him on. He moved to Moscow in 2001 from Rostov-on-Don. At this time, the state (I can’t remember now) was keen to support the arts. For ten years, Serebrennikov performed in the largest theaters in Moscow, eventually attracting the attention of Putin’s top adviser Vladislav his Surkov. Surkov created a “sovereign democracy”. Surkov is a rare term that refers to a system that is free of Western intervention and democratic only to the extent that its leaders allow it. Surkov saw the artist as a necessary tool in the arrangement. It is a testament to both Russia’s modernity and its tentative patience for free expression. In 2011, Serebrennikov took charge of Platform, a new federally funded arts festival, and a year later he took charge of Gogol Center, the sleepy theater he turned into an avant-garde performance hub. did. At the same time, he took part in anti-Putin protests and staged an opera that parodied Kremlin politics. He adapted a novel written by Surkov under a pseudonym and made it a commentary on corruption.
Putin’s return to power in 2012 sparked massive protests across Russia. Putin demoted Mr Surkov and gave the post of culture minister to Vladimir Medinsky, a nationalist who warned against art contrary to “traditional values”. In the same year, members of the feminist punk group Pussy He Riot were arrested and put on trial. Around this time, Serebrennikov made his first attempt at a Tchaikovsky biopic, but was refused state funding because the script contained homosexual themes. (Serebrennikov has spoken out in support of his LGBT community in needy Russia, and his film deals with the composer’s secret sexuality.) Instead, he received funding from Abramovich. and was released in 2016. “student,” This was a mockery of the country’s growing conservatism and religious hypocrisy. The following year, Serebrennikov was indicted on fraud charges regarding his $1.9 million state subsidy to the platform.
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I didn’t change. The country has changed, ”Serebrennikov told me. When the director looked up at himself on a national news channel, among other top news stories, while having dinner with friends in 2014, he began to notice the propaganda machine raging against him. “We turned the volume up, and it was literal. America is bad, Russia’s Olympics are good, and do we really need a director like this?” I looked at him as if he were a man. “You start to understand that dark clouds are starting to gather, but you don’t know why,” he said.
Serebrennikov was arrested in St. Petersburg, where he was filming. “summer,” A nostalgic look back at the Soviet underground music scene. When he entered his hotel room late at night, he heard a knock on the door. Instead, his six officers from his FSB, Russia’s national security agency, put Serebrennikov in a van and drove eight hours to Moscow. When his producer, Stewart, asked the hotel manager to open Serebrennikov’s room, no one knew he was gone until the next morning when he realized his bed had not been slept.
In Moscow, Serebrennikov was sentenced to house arrest in his 474-square-foot apartment while awaiting trial. After Serebrennikov’s attorney petitioned the court to allow him to take a daily walk to get some fresh air, Stewart came up with the idea to reconstruct the film set in Serebrennikov’s neighborhood. A flash drive was then slipped under his door and Serebrennikov watched the take and made notes. “From a production standpoint, this is a crazy way to make a movie,” Stewart told me.
Creatively, Serebrennikov’s house arrest was productive. He directed two of his plays on his Zoom, directed four operas, and wrote five of his screenplays, including his next film, Petrov’s Cold. He was already on trial when we shot it in the fall of 2019. The charges revolved around the use of petty cash. This is a legal way of paying vendors, but in this case the state could argue that the directors misappropriated the funds. The hearing was in the morning, so Serebrennikov shot the film at night. “Basically, he didn’t sleep the whole shoot,” Stewart told me. Serebrennikov was convicted of fraud in June 2020. The following year he was dismissed from his center Gogol.
