YOLANTA

Natalia Barannikova – Russia

If you think that the theatre monologue can be only spoken, danced or played – you are wrong. Natalia Barannikova, an actress from Moscow, presents a mono-puppet-opera (!) to the music composed by Peter Tchaikovsky (he wrote YOLANTA, a lyric opera, in 1891). Iolanta is picking fruit with her friends. She is blind but she does not know that she is different from anyone else. Her nurse and her friends lull her to sleep. The physician insists that there is no cure for Iolanta unless she is told she is blind and wants to be cured. The King, her father, will not accept this. Robert, Duke of Burgundy, who is to marry Iolanta but loves another, comes upon the girl sleeping in the garden. He leaves, while his companion Vaudêmont falls in love with her and explains the glories of light to her. The King and the physician return, the former angry that Iolanta now understands her condition, and the doctor hoping for her recovery and determination to regain her sight in order to save Vaudêmont from the death that King has otherwise threatened him. In the end Iolanta recovers her sight and is united with Vaudêmont, while Robert is released from his engagement to her.

Duration: 75 minutes (without a break)

Language: Russian

Thursday, 06.03., 15.00, KULTURFORUM