The Blue Rose is back

LVIV – The first three performances in the playbill are the last season premieres: Nevolnyk [The Slave. – Ed.] by T. Shevchenko and M. Kropyvnytsky (directed by Fedir Stryhun), Myna Mazailo by P. Kulish (directed by Hryhorii Shumeiko) and Ostannii Hrechkosii [The Last Buckwheat Sower. – Ed.] written and directed by O. Ohorodnyk. According to the theater’s director general Andrii Matsiak, the 94th season will present 34 performances. At the beginning of the season, on September 11, the theater is also going on a one-day tour to Rivne with the performance The Lady with the Camellias by A. Dumas-son.

As creative director and chief director of the theater Fedir Stryhun told The Day, the new season is going to be as interesting as the previous one. In October the Lviv residents and visitors will see the premiere performance Blakytna Troianda [The Blue Rose. – Ed.]. It will be recalled that it was the first drama by Lesia Ukrainka and the first Ukrainian psychological drama. People’s Artists of Ukraine Taisia Lytvynenko and Fedir Stryhun are working on the performance. By the way, the Zankovetska Theater staged this play over 40 years ago, in 1969, with the participation of Anna Plokhotniuk (she played Liubov) and Bohdan Kokh (he played Mylevsky).

The next premiere will happen in November, Romeo and Juliet, which is the adaptation of the story by the Czech author Jan Otcenasek Romeo, Julia a tma [Romeo, Juliet and Darkness. – Ed.] directed by People’s Artist of Ukraine Alla Babenko. The leading roles are played by Liubov Borovska and Yevhen Fedorchenko.

Director Vadym Sikorsky has not chosen what to stage. He is hesitating between the three plays: The Inspector General by M. Hohol, The Little Prince by A. de Saint-Exupery and Blow the Breeze by Janis Rainis.

“I hope to stage eight performances in the new season: six of them on the big stage and two of them on the chamber stage,” Matsiak told The Day. “The problem is that the state budget does not fund the new performances. We pay for everything with the money the theater earns which limits our creative abilities.”

Despite the permanent underfunding the theater is not going to change ticket prices. “Although our prices are democratic, 40 to 50 hryvnias, we can only reduce them since we want to keep the audience,” Matsiak says.