Russian Plays

Aleksander Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol, Mikhail Bulgakov, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Richard Crane

• Publisher: Oberon Books
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781849430920
• eBook ISBN: 9781849433358
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

Includes the plays Master and Margarita (Satan's Ball), Vanity, Gogol and Brothers Karamazov
From original translations by Faynia Williams. Crane and Williams' sensational Master and Margarita (Satan's Ball) marked the beginning of a golden period when their company BrightonTheatre premiered a succession of ground-breaking new plays, which took festivals by storm and toured the world. Out of the spectacular Bulgakov, came the minimalist Gogol, a chilling evocation of Gogol's whirling world, distilled into a nightmare for today. Then Vanity, a 'glittering diamond of a play', reclaimed Pushkin's Eugene Onegin as a intimate reflection on a love mistimed and shattered by social convention. From these successes, Brighton Theatre moved onto the main Edinburgh programme with Brothers Karamazov: a leap into the dark world of epilepsy, orthodoxy and murder in the family, which won triumphant reviews and international acclaim. Published now for the first time, these four plays flourished out of a unique collaboration of author and director, which saw them progressing from fringe to mainstream, West End and Off-Broadway without changing their style, and becoming an acknowledged inspiration for many of today's theatre artists.

SATAN’S BALL

FROM BULGAKOV’S
MASTER AND MARGARITA

Poster design by Dan Sneider

Characters

The parts are divided between 15 actors as follows:

1. IVAN NIKOLAYEVICH BEZDOMNY – writer
MATTHEW - ex-tax-collector
AUDIENCE MEMBER/BALL GUEST

2. MIKHAIL ALEXANDROVICH BERLIOZ – Chairman of the Writers’ Union
DR. STRAVINSKY – psychiatrist
PUBLISHER
GEORGE BENGALSKY – Master of Ceremonies
AUDIENCE MEMBER

3. PONTIUS PILATE – Procurator of Judea
AUDIENCE MEMBER/BALL GUEST

4. SECRETARY – to Pilate
PRASKOVYA FYODOROVNA – psychiatric nurse
AUDIENCE MEMBER/BALL GUEST

5. YESHUA HA-NOTSRI – vagrant preacher
THE MASTER

6. MARK MURIBELLUM – centurion
POLICE OFFICER/SECURITY GUARD
AUDIENCE MEMBER

7. WOLAND – Maestro of Black Magic

8. HELLA – witch-demon

9. BEHEMOTH – cat-demon

10. AZAZELLO – boy-demon

11. ARCHIBALD ARCHIBALDOVICH – committee member
CAIAPHAS – High Priest
BYSTANDER/AUDIENCE MEMBER
LATUNSKY – critic
BORIS MIKHAILOVICH – Margarita’s husband

12. NASTASYA LUKINISHNA – committee member
BYSTANDER/AUDIENCE MEMBER
STAGE MANAGER/CLERK
LAPSHENNIKOVA – critic

13. TAMARA POLUMESYATZ – committee member
BYSTANDER/AUDIENCE MEMBER
DEPUTY STAGE MANAGER/CLERK
ARIMANOVA – critic

14. SASHA RYUKHIN – committee member
JUDAS OF KARIOTH – informer
MSTISLAV LAVROVICH – critic
BYSTANDER/AUDIENCE MEMBER

15. MARGARITA
SINGER

The action takes place on a floor area and three ascending Constructivist-style stages, linked by flights of steps. “A” is the highest and smallest stage; “B” is the middle stage; “C” is the lowest and largest. The floor area is “D”. The costumes are simple and uniform. Unless otherwise stated, the men wear grey trousers, grey jackets buttoned to the top and grey flat caps; the women wear grey skirts, grey jackets and grey head-scarves. Underwear is grey.

Satan’s Ball was first performed by the University of Bradford Drama Group at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 1977, directed and designed by Faynia Williams, music by Phil Wharton.

It won a Scotsman Fringe First for Most Enterprising New Production and was nominated Best Director/Designer, London Critics Awards. It was revived at the University of California Davis, directed and designed by Faynia Williams, in November 1984.

ACT ONE

Light discovers three SINGERS, in red tabards, on A, B and C. They sing.

THE TOWER OF STATE

A SINGER: Arise —

B SINGER: Work —

C SINGER: Build —

ALL THREE: the Tower of State!
Live, learn, thrive —
Man the Master of his Fate!
All collective, all as one,
march the People’s Army on!
Iron-muscled, iron-willed —
Arise, work, build!

Light discovers the COMPANY in biomechanics poses, ranged from A to D. All wear red tabards.

COMPANY: Arise, work, build
the Tower of State!
Live, learn, thrive —
Man the Master of his Fate!
All collective, all as one,
march the People’s Army on!
Iron-muscled, iron-willed —
Arise, work, build!

SINGER: From the heat of the battle
as the red blood flowed,
from the sweat of the struggle
to shed our weary load,
from the teeth of despair,
from the roar of the gun —

COMPANY: We rose, we laboured, we won!
Arise, work, build… (etc.)

SINGER: (Over the chorus.)
But beware brother builders
of evil schemes,
of temples of fanciful
and superstitious dreams!
Renounce where revisionist
and backslider lurk.
The word, brother builders, is Work!

COMPANY: Arise, work, build
the Tower of State!
Live, learn, thrive —
Man the Master of his Fate!

Company descend to D.

All collective, all as one,
march the People’s Army on!1
Iron-muscled, iron-willed —
Arise, work, build!

Blackout.

Light discovers BERLIOZ and BEZDOMNY seated on a block on D. BEZDOMNY has a bundle of scrawled manuscript.

BEZDOMNY: (Excited.) I’m writing a play debunking Jesus Christ! What do you think of it — the idea that Christ was insane? It came to me in a flash! I can’t sleep for thinking about it. All my writing up to now has been a preparation for this. But I have to have your approval. I couldn’t proceed without being a hundred percent sure that every angle, every inference, is grounded in officially acceptable thinking. I feel if I went ahead with it, if I poured my whole life into it, and you turned round and said: No, it’s not what we want — I’d kill myself!

He bursts into tears, recovers immediately.

I’ve made a few notes. (Thumbs through pile.) I’d like you to have a look at them. Tell me what you think. It’s just a string of ideas, basic situations. You see I’ve drawn a parallel between the Roman Principate and our own system of government. I call it ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-title page
• Titlepage
• Copyright
• Contents
• Dedication
• BROTHERS KARAMAZOV
• INTRODUCTION
• BROTHERS KARAMAZOV
• VANITY
• GOGOL
• SATAN’S BALL