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Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty
Henry M. Robert

A WORLD OF SENSUOUS THINGS Audience takes in Leopold von Sacher-Masoch’s “Cricket” fantasy at Kyiv Conservatory’s Operatic Studio

13 November, 2012 - 00:00

Born in Galicia (Halychyna), Sacher-Masoch’s scandalous novel Die Messalinen Wiens (1874) and even more shocking memoirs which, along with the author’s sexual preferences, opened a new chapter in sexual pathology, masochism, seemed risquО material for stage production. Yet choreographer Serhiy Shvydky and actress Iryna Konyk, authors of the play, “Cricket,” succeeded in dancing around the over-realistic piquancy of the plot (an Austrian with the Slavic name Severyn finding a source of unmatched erotic pleasure in his sufferings and servile obedience to his otherwise overbearing mistress, Wanda). They consciously deviated from the main subjects, brutal sex and, of course, masochism.

Dialogue is kept strictly within the bounds of decency. Actually, the novel here is recounted in the language of plastique, dissolving in a series of extremely expressive sensuous images. The setting is traditional: a plush Renaissance palace. It seems equally allocated between the three characters: Wanda and Severyn’s two “egos.” The heroine, “Venus in fur,” wears a perfectly modest visage, but her back is sensuously bare. In general, she offers little to remind one of the author’s demonic seductress. At times this woman, writhing in ecstasy, seems little more than a masochistic fetish triggering off a pitched battle between the hero’s two inner personalities.

By achieving a convincing split-personality effect, the authors manage to portray the young man’s extraordinary inner sensual world. In him, thoughts provoke desires, begetting passions which sharpen his perception. In a duet with Serhiy Marchenko, Serhiy Shvydky brings forth countless choreographic fantasies. Like Siamese twins they mechanically repeat each other’s movement, and then one picks the other’s plastique phrase, accentuating it, capitalizing on it, improvising...

Emotionally unfettered, these improvisations lend the spectacle some primitive all-conquering strength when passions boil, threatening to explode. In fact, this “archaic plasma” is where Severyn’s perversion starts. He bathes in it, nourishing his masochism which becomes almost tangible to the accompaniment of genuine Carpathian folk melodies. Shvydky dances to their syncopated ragged rhythm, adding their folk aura to erotic ecstasy, creating that very atmosphere which captivated the Russian populists and prompted the French to award von Sacher-Masoch the Legion of Honor. An enviable creative insight, no doubt about it.

Apart from national exotics, the play reveals a postulate inherent in Sacher-Masoch’s works, later formulated by French philosopher Jules Delesse: “A people as beautiful as nature and as cruel as a woman can be; an intellectual enjoys serving them all...” There is a dramatized romantic touch to the costumes done by Nadiya Kudriavtseva, in harmony with the writer’s “Galician Stories.” A hint at the motive of civilized man’s rapprochement with the environs through an erotic worship of the flesh rather than the soul. Iryna Konyk’s Wanda emerges not only as an Aubrey Beardsley model or Renaissance courtesan. She is also a nymph, the princess of fields and valleys. A minor discordant note in the composition is probably played by the real furs in which the heroine wraps herself. Yet her impersonation, controversial and impassioned, reminds one of the turn of the century “dancing dramatic actress” Ida Rubinstein of whom a contemporary critic wrote: “There would be nothing simpler than listing her numerous flaws as a performer. However, her domineering aristocratic bearing with graceful long lines is obviously marked by something that can only be described as extraordinary.” This description seems to fit the modern actress’ performance as well.

“Cricket” could hardly be referred to as a faultless production. Yet through its plastique metamorphoses one glimpses what John Amos Comenius called a “world of sensuous things.” It is still rich in mysteries to be discovered, a process that can make one’s life enjoyable and exciting.

This is how “The Cricket” portrays a masochistic fetish Iryna Konyk in the role of Wanda

 

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