FINIST THE BRAVE FALCON
Directed by Zhenya Berkovich
Written by Svetlana Petriichuk
Production: SOSO DAUGHTERS
Zhenya Berkovich’s staging of Svetlana Petriichuk’s provocative, documentary style play, tells the story of a Russian woman who befriends and is seduced by a member of an Islamic radical sect online, goes to Syria, marries him and upon her eventual return to Russia is tried as a terrorist. In recent years, there have been hundreds, if not thousands of such cases in Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. From what are these women running? What is driving them to abandon their friends, relatives, universities and workplaces for the promise of some shadowy paradise? All this takes place in the metaphysical space of the Russian fairy tale “Финист - Ясный сокол” where the heroine - Maryushka - seeks and cannot find her betrothed, the mysterious hero, whose face she has never seen and will never see, but is ready to sacrifice everything in order to meet him.
Presented in Russian with English subtitles.
In Cinemas May 2022.
Photos: Alexander Andrievich
Language: Russian
Translation: English subtitles
Running time: 1h 32min (No Intermission)
SOSO DAUGHTERS is an independent theatre project founded in October 2018 by director and playwright Zhenya Berkovich. Over the past three years, the project has staged the play Counting, based on a story by Georgian writer Tamta Melashvili, Meteodevil based on the graphic novel by Gulag prisoner Olga Ranitskaya, and created and presented at the Gulag History Museum in Moscow, and the play Finist the Brave Falcon written by Svetlana Petriichuk, which was a participant of the Russian Case program of the Golden Mask Festival and became one of the most talked about performances of the 2021 season.
ZHENYA BERKOVICH, a graduate of the Moscow Art Theater School (workshop of Kirill Serebrennikov), has staged productions in some of Russia's most renowned theatres, including, among others, Russian Beauty (Gogol Center), Marina (Gogol Center), The Lark (Moscow Art Theatre), Penguins (MTuZ), Sun Line (Alexandrinsky Theatre, St. Petersburg), and Hamlet (Sverdlovsk Drama Theater, Yekaterinburg). Her production of Counting (SOSO Daughters) was shortlisted for a Golden Mask Award as one of the most notable performances of the 2018/2019 season. Zhenya is Artistic Director of the independent theatre project SOSO Daughters.
Creative Team
Director – Zhenya Berkovich
Author – Svetlana Petriichuk
Producer – Alexander Andrievich
Stage Design and Costumes – Ksenia Sorokina
Composer – Olga Shaidullina
Assistant Director – Amina Mindiyarova
Vocal Teacher – Svetlana Speranskaya
Lighting Design – Elena Perelman
Cast
Natasha Gorbas
Anastasiya Sapozhnikova
Yuliya Skirina
Marietta Tsigal-Polishchuk
Svetlana Speranskaya
Margarita Tolstoganova
Ira Sova
Natalia Sapozhnikova
Leonika Konstantinova