The Director's Prism: E. T. A. Hoffmann and the Russian Theatrical Avant-Garde

Posner, Dassia N.

Dassia N. Posner

2016

The Director's Prism investigates how and why three of Russia's most innovative directors— Vsevolod Meyerhold, Alexander Tairov, and Sergei Eisenstein—used the fantastical tales of German Romantic writer E. T. A. Hoffmann to reinvent the rules of theatrical practice. Because the rise of the director and the Russian cult of Hoffmann closely coincided, Posner argues, many characteristics we associate with avant-garde theater—subjective perspective, breaking through the fourth wall, activating the spectator as a co-creator—become uniquely legible in the context of this engagement. Posner examines the artistic poetics of Meyerhold's grotesque, Tairov's mime-drama, and Eisenstein's theatrical attraction through production analyses, based on extensive archival research, that challenge the notion of theater as a mirror to life, instead viewing the director as a prism through whom life is refracted. A resource for scholars and practitioners alike, this groundbreaking study provides a fresh, provocative perspective on experimental theater, intercultural borrowings, and the nature of the creative process.

ISBN(s)

978-0-8101-3355-6 (paper)
978-0-8101-3356-3 (hardcover)
978-0-8101-3357-0 (e-book)

Subject

Performing Arts

Citable Link

Photograph of Samuil Vermel as Pierrot

From Introduction: Hoffmann’s Prism

Samuil Vermel as Pierrot in Pierrette’s Veil, by Arthur Schnitzler, music by Ernő Dohnányi, directed by Alexander Tairov (photo from the 1916 remount at the Moscow Kamerny Theatre). Photo: M. Sakharov & P. Orlov, 1917. Laurence Senelick Collection.

Costume design for Nina in an elaborate ball gown with an orange shawl and black embroidered train. She wears a simple bracelet over one of her elbow-length gloves.

Nina at the ball in Masquerade, costume design

From Chapter 1: Meyerhold-Dapertutto: Framing the Grotesque

Alexander Golovin, costume design for Nina at the ball in Lermontov’s Masquerade, directed by Vsevolod Meyerhold, Alexandrinsky Theatre (premiere: February 25, 1917). КП 8320. Copyright © A. A. Bakhrushin State Central Theatre Museum, Moscow.

Cubist design for Salomé’s dance of the seven veils, all angles and curves, with Salomé’s arms stretched upward, one leg lifted, an orange veil streaming behind her against the backdrop of a red staircase.

Costume design for Salomé’s dance of the seven veils

From Chapter 2: Tairov-Celionati: Mime-Drama and Kaleidoscopic Commedia

Alexandra Exter, costume design for Salomé’s dance of the seven veils, in Salomé, by Oscar Wilde, directed by Alexander Tairov, Moscow Kamerny Theatre (premiere: October 9, 1917). КП 62579. Copyright © A. A. Bakhrushin State Central Theatre Museum, Moscow.

Alisa Koonen as Salomé, arms outstretched, wearing a thorny, beaded crown and a dress festooned with strings of beads, with rings on her fingers and a fan in her upper hand.

Photo of Alisa Koonen as Salomé in Salomé

From Chapter 2: Tairov-Celionati: Mime-Drama and Kaleidoscopic Commedia

Alisa Koonen as Salomé in Salomé, by Oscar Wilde, directed by Alexander Tairov, designed by Alexandra Exter, Moscow Kamerny Theatre (premiere: October 9, 1917). Photo: M. Sakharov and V. Orlov, 1917. Laurence Senelick Collection.

This pencil sketch features several figures in turbans and robes, center, framed by commedia dell'arte characters that include Pantalone (left) and Harlequin (right).

Costume design for Amusements on the Water and in a Field

From Chapter 3: Peregrinus Tyss Meets Pipifax: Eisenstein, the Grotesque, and the Attraction

Sergei Eisenstein, costume design for Amusements on the Water and in a Field (c. 1917–18). “Harlequin’s entrance.” Signed “Sir Gay.” Russian State Archive of Literature and Art, f. 1923, op. 1, ed. khr. 698: 31

$In this design sketch of a city street, created for Gozzi’s Green Bird, Eisenstein experiments with refracting Sebastiano Serlio’s 1545 comedy stage design (from On Perspective, his second architecture book). Onlooking framing figures are sketched into several of the balconies.$

The Director's Prism: E. T. A. Hoffmann and the Russian Theatrical Avant-Garde

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Photograph of Samuil Vermel as Pierrot

Nina at the ball in Masquerade, costume design

Costume design for Salomé’s dance of the seven veils

Photo of Alisa Koonen as Salomé in Salomé

Costume design for Amusements on the Water and in a Field

Scene design for The Green Bird

Scene design for Four Harlequins

Photo of Vertinsky in Black Pierrot costume