All understand that a rock opera, sung in a foreign language, and with a very specific choreography of Régis Obadia, is quite a special product, intended definitely not for those, who come to shows just to lose their wits there, or, at least, to spent time in glamorous atmosphere.
And now the first spectators were so kind as to have come and share their impressions. Having them summed up, it is possible to say that the most commonly voiced suggestion is that the very dramatic composition of the performance should be improved - so that the audience could better follow the line of the mane hero, an envoy or an emissary of planet Crizon (by the way, many of them fairly well understood what that name means), and at the same time by doing so to connect better some separate episodes of the opera to make it a single, complete and indivisible whole. How can it be done? It’s a theatre director who has to know such things. However the reproach cannot be just waved off. As for me, I also have an impression that every spectator, especially if he/she has not read the libretto attentively and from its very beginning up to its very end, understands the plot in his/her own way - as Russians say, “to the extent of his/her own naughtiness” - and, having learnt the interpretation of the plot of the opera by any other person, decides to come to its performance once again, just in order to check, if the interlocutor’s point of view could be agreed to. Is it not a victory, won by the director, even though, maybe, it has not been planned beforehand? That is why, I think, many cult theatre directors of Moscow, Roman Viktyuk and Dmitry Bertman included, highly appreciated the performance.
Some critical remarks concerned somewhat “unripe” quality of the dances, performed by, undoubtedly, highly professional dancers, also can be regarded as quite just ones. However, what performance can be absolutely ‘polished’ at its first night? The answer is: no one. However, everything will be much smoother some 5-7 performances later. Here it should be mentioned, that even most strict ballet critics were quite satisfied with the choreography, and we only hope that they will not change their opinion till they start writing their articles for Mass Media.
It was really nice that everyone present specially noticed excellent voices of vocalists, who sang without using prewritten phonograms of their voices while dancing intensively at the same time. Some people thought it was not necessary; others, on the contrary, thought that the singers could participate in dancing even more actively. Well, tastes differ.
Now I want to discuss the main item if the performance, which is music. Music, composed by Lisa Mond and comprising 19 songs and 5 dances. That means nearly an hour and a half of continuous and uninterrupted music sounding, amalgamated into a mono composition. It is really difficult to believe in that, especially if we remember that all episodes and scenes are quite different, both in mood and content. I think that musical critics (who should not be mixed up with dilettantes and professional revilers!) will find the opera to be worthy of writing really good reviews and notices about it. The majority of the songs are real potential hits, and a good proof of this is the fact that many radio stations have expressed their wish to take them for rotation and quite many labels want to issue СDs with records of them.
A representative of the producing team ensured us that in the nearest future a booklet with brief synopsis of songs and photos taken by Yelena Fetisova will be issued, too.
The actors seemed to be so exhausted because of a pre-premiere rush that they asked to shift interviews with them to an ‘after-June-5’ period. We do understand them well and are ready to meet actors again at any agreed time. I would really want to write a separate article, based on interviews with actors, authors and producers of the opera - that is to say, to get information at first hand, in its true value. I think, that a name of the future article will be: “Homo sum, humani nihel a me alienum puto”.

Pavel Vasilenko
Photo by Yelena Fetisova