It’s hard to call Kolyada’s “Hamlet” a faithful adaptation of Shakespeare’s play. What we will see onstage is a world full of savages living and dancing on the ruins of the culture and refinement they used to have. After a series of cataclysms, they practically lost all benefits of civilization, all they have left is a shower dangling sadly from the scaffolding. Someone keeps scribbling on or attach something to the cheep reproductions of paintings, the only remains of cultural heritage they have. Their religion was substituted with pagan beliefs. The stage is full of kitsch, there is a ridiculous number of Leonardo da Vinci’s Giocondas or a black plastic bathtub of enormous seize that is being turned into Ofelia’s grave or a bed for a husband and wife. One thing that definitely stands out is of Oleg Yagodin as Hamlet, half tradesman, half hooligan. He is dynamic, disrespectful of any existing norms of good taste, alive and theatrical.

Kolyada Theatre was established on 4 December 2001, the birthday of Nikolay Kolyada, its artistic director, who rendered great service to Russian art, the laureate of the International Stanislavsky Award. The main goal of the theatre is to popularize the Ural drama. At the moment in its repertoire it has 19 performances both for children and adults. They are known for their ongoing experiments in search for a new language in theatre, and organizing new projects. For five years it has been the founder of the International Dramatists Competition, recognized around the world. In its repertoire it has classic plays (“Hamlet”, “The Government Inspector”), plays by young artists (K. Kostenko, T. Shirayev), plays by Nikolay Kolyada (“Amigo”, “Phoenix”, “Tutankhamun”) and many others. In the new season, together with the Centre of New Drama it will continue to stage contemporary Ural dramatists.