Part one:
Can 'Cats' win over Russians?
By Sophia Kishkovsky International Herald Tribune
Saturday, March 19, 2005
MOSCOW"Cats," the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical that made a record run on Broadway, London and around the world has opened in Moscow, where musicals are still associated with the 2002 hostage-taking of an entire theater by Chechen terrorists during a performance of the musical "Nord-Ost."
.Those two shows are also now linked through their actors. Several who performed in "Nord-Ost" are playing in "Cats," part of a new caste of Russian performers who specialize in musicals, which are still relatively new to Russia, a sign of a hunger here to catch up to Europe and the United States in terms of mass entertainment and consumer culture.
."A viewer walks in and understands that this is a brand, that this is what he paid money for," said Dmitri Bogachyov, general director of Stage Holding Russia. He said the Russian version cost "millions of dollars," but declined to be specific. (His company is part of Stage Holding, the Dutch theatrical production company that has staged "Cats" and other musicals, including "Mamma Mia," the ode to Abba, and Lloyd Webber's "Jesus Christ Superstar," around Europe.)
.On Friday, a red carpet was laid out at the theater for the premiere and for the arrival of Lloyd Webber, making his second visit to Moscow; his first was in 1989 for a two-night showing of the German version of "Cats."
.Bogachyov also produced "Nord-Ost" and "12 Chairs," the musical version of a Soviet satirical classic. He said the choice of "Cats" for Russia was made only after much market research and efforts to avoid past mistakes, like the staging of "42nd Street" in 2002 - in English, with American actors.
.Grizabella, Mungojerrie, Skimbleshanks and Deuteronomy are singing "Pamyat" for "Memory," in a translation that hews almost literally to the original adaptation of T.S. Eliot's "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats." The cats' names are simply transliterated into Russian. Aleksei Kortnev, an actor and pop star who wrote the libretto for, and starred in, the Russian version of "The Witches of Eastwick," translated "Cats."
.Bogachyov is counting on Russian literary pretensions to draw a high class of viewers to "Cats" - "he is a Nobel laureate" he said of Eliot - and moderate ticket prices, starting at 400 rubles (about $14.50) and ranging to 1,600 rubles, to keep the masses coming.
.Bomb-sniffing dogs patrolled the premises before Thursday's packed preview and security guards guarded the Moscow Palace of Youth Theater, a behemoth of the Soviet era that has been revamped for this production, the viewing hall turned into the traditional "Cats" dump, the foyer ceiling painted and lit to resemble a starry night.
.Christine Cartwright, the resident director of the original London production who was involved in preparing this show, came to Moscow to prepare for the premier.
