Biography and productions of director Vasily Barkhatov

He looks too young, too lucky, and his career is too rapid. All that he does is extraordinary. This causes envy and grumbling on the part of ill-wishers: “His surname is too beautiful, probably invented. It's not just like that: the boy works on the main opera stages of the country, scoffs at the classics as he wants, no one can pull him off! Someone promotes it …"

From such conversations, Vasily Barkhatov can only be protected by work, the direction of productions of such a level that it is clear what promotes his own talent, and behind his back - conviction in his decisions, imagination, love of music, cultural erudition and much more …

It's all about the balalaika

He was born in 1983 in Moscow, in a family of journalists. Vasily Barkhatov's childhood passed under normal conditions in a bedroom metropolitan area with running around garages and roofs. But the status of an intelligent family dictated some standards in education. Among them is a music school. Classes were planned for a fashionable guitar, but the boy’s hand, when he was brought to the Children's Creativity House, was still small, and parents were advised to send their son to balalaika class. This folk instrument became his specialization in secondary musical education.

He says that he didn’t have a childhood dream of doing opera directing. The story of the choice of life path in the presentation of Vasily Barkhatov is simple. Acquaintance with Rosetta Yakovlevna Nemchinskaya, professor of the musical theater faculty from GITIS, was accidental. Unlike other teachers who believed that directing is a profession for people with life experience, she also took very young children to her course. In order not to be in the army and have a chance at entering a university, Vasily began to study with Rosetta Yakovlevna. At the age of 16, he became a student of GITIS, the department of directing and mastery of an actor in a musical theater.

First staging

He often says that since the schoolchildren organized cultural trips to the opera house, when the halls were filled according to the mandatory order distribution of tickets to training and labor groups, he feels an organic intolerance of performances for which the viewer can only be driven by force. Therefore, for productions he is interested in rarely performed, extraordinary works, and for classical operas new ideas, a new look, a new form are sought.

The first musical performance by Vasily Barkhatov was The Diary of a Disappeared (2004), staged in Helikon-Opera based on Leos Janacek’s vocal cycle. This scene is often provided for debuts to young musicians, attracting great interest from critics and the public. This happened with the production of the 21-year-old director, who also became the production designer of this mini-opera. Such performances are usually called sensational.

Way to the Mariinsky

In 2005, Vasily Barkhatov, a newly made director of musical performances, left the walls of GITIS. His biography began with the Rostov State Musical Theater, where he staged the opera dilogy “Director of Music” from two works by Mozart and Salieri - authors whose names, simply put together, already give rise to many associations.

At this time, the artistic director of the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg Valery Gergiev was looking for directors for a new project. His goal was the stage embodiment of all the works of Shostakovich, written by him for musical theater. One of the project participants was Barkhatov. Vasily, the director recommended by the leadership of the Rostov Musical Theater, staged the Moscow-Cheryomushki operetta at the Mariinsky Theater in 2006. Later this unexpected Shostakovich was introduced to the European public in London.

Golden Mask

Gergiev Barkhatov considers his real godfather. When in 2007 he invited Vasily to the Mariinsky Theater, a rare opera - Enufa by Janacek was chosen for the production. This performance, like many subsequent productions of Barkhatov, was nominated for the Golden Mask Russian National Theater Award.

Unexpected ideas of the young director were perceived as a provocation. There were many such moves. One of the most shocking is the introduction of the character depicting the main character in old age into the play by Berlioz’s opera “Benvenuto Cellini”. Some were shocked by the choice of actor for this role, which was made by Vasily Barkhatov. A photo of Sergey Shnurov standing on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater will long excite opera aesthetes.

Barkhatov’s performances were often nominated for the country's main theater award:

A. Smelkov’s opera The Brothers Karamazov (2009) at the Mariinsky Theater,
the musical “Michel Legrand and Jacques Demi“ Cherbourg Umbrellas ”(2010) at the Musical Theater“ Cannon ”(St. Petersburg),
R. Shchedrin’s opera Dead Souls (2011) at the Mariinsky Theater,
Wagner’s opera Flying Dutchman (2014) at the Mikhailovsky Theater and others.

Versatile director

The vast interests and indomitable energy of Barkhatov led him to participate in projects not related to his profile specialty, and his wild imagination and extraordinary staging methods came in handy in drama theater and on television. The first non-core production was “The Robbers” by Schiller in the A.S. Pushkin Moscow Drama Theater (2009), then in the “Shelter of the Comedian” he directed another Schiller drama - “Cunning and Love” (2011).

2012 performance at the Moscow Art Theater. Chekhov, who was called “The New Suffering of Young V., ” reminded many of them of the style of television shows, the production of which Barkhatov was also actively involved. With his participation, Channel One showed Olivier Show, Yesterday Live, The Phantom of the Opera, and others.

In 2012, Barkhatov tried his hand as a film director, staging the film "Atomic Ivan", a script for which he himself also wrote. He also put on circus shows and shot clips.