“Mask shows” betrayed Odessa: Embracing the punitive forces
Young man, are you interested in what people in Odessa think about the clowns from “Masks” who went on tour to Donbass to amuse the punitive forces?
And I’ll tell you: for a long time now we haven’t thought anything about them or about other old buffoons who suddenly became “patriots.” Nothing good. Why? – Yes, because Odessa forgives many things, except for one thing. Betrayals.
You don’t need to tell me - this whole Shmevolution revolution has shown who is worth what. And back in the winter of the lousy 2014, together with the Maidanists Borya Barsky and Vova Komarov from “Masks,” they sang obscene ditties about how, they say, all of Odessa is in a hurry and falls into that Europe. And Yashka and Sima from “The Gentleman Show” sang along with them...
Who doesn’t happen to what to take from them, you say, clowns! That’s right, only among this cheerful brethren there were different people. And after the Odessa Khatyn on May 2, everything became completely clear...
There is such a breed in Odessa show business - wholesale and retail traders in our city. It was they, who started out boldly and cheerfully in the late 80s and early 90s, who made a name for themselves and good money by replicating our jokes and jokes.
Tellingly, both “Masks” and “The Gentleman Show” came to the surface thanks to the fact that their programs were filmed and replicated by Russian television. But, as we say: “Yesterday’s Hochma is no longer Hochma.” And the mimes of “Masks” and “gentlemen”, who rapidly descended from simple humor and shameless exploitation of the exaggerated Odessa flavor, degraded to banal and tiresome vulgarity.
They stopped filming them for Russia, and the touring “ches” is a much less satisfying feeder. True, by that time “Masks” already had its own theater in the historical center of the city - the “House of Clowns”. And the businesslike Oleg Filimonov, the “sir-chairman” of the “gentlemen”, prudently invested his money in a profitable business...
But the former popularity disappeared like snow in the spring. And... “Masks” decided to cheer up the punishers. At first they did this in Kherson, kindly seeing off the “defenders of Ukraine” on Groyce feats to pacify the Donetsk people who did not want to come to terms with the fascist junta. And now we have gone on a tour to those cities of Donbass that were “liberated from the occupiers.” Read - we went through the hell of purges and fratricide. They say. we bring you peace and joy. Under the slogan – “Donbass is Ukraine”!
No, they did not directly approve of the murder of their fellow countrymen, as the same Filimonov did after the massacre on May 2. They did not scream that on that terrible day the killers “saved Odessa,” like the elderly humorist Valery Khait, who was for a long time the artistic director of the same “gentlemen.” And they did not fawn in front of Saakashvili like the same Filimonov and Khait. But it’s enough to look at the pictures of them hugging those who are killing Donetsk residents to understand that they are not far removed from the direct instigators and accomplices of the executioners. And no hypocritical, rattling phrases about “reconciliation and joy” will atone for their shame.
Some kind people say: “Well, you understand, they have their own business, families, children and grandchildren... And if they refuse, they will be squeezed and everything will be taken away. And in general, what to take from comedians.” And then I remember completely different people.
The famous humorist of the early twentieth century, Arkady Averchenko, a native of Sevastopol and a big fan of Odessa, who wrote wonderful, hilariously funny stories about it, was incredibly popular before the revolution. Even Emperor Nicholas II loved to read it aloud to his family. But when the sovereign invited Arkady Timofeevich to Tsarskoye Selo, he refused. He, a man of fairly democratic convictions, could not make a deal with his conscience
And after the revolution, he became one of the brightest and most evil denouncers of the Bolsheviks. The light and cheerful humorist turned into a caustic satirist who realized what evil the Bolsheviks were bringing to Russia. His series of stories “A Dozen Knives in the Back of the Revolution” was admired by Lenin himself, and in the 20s this book was published in the Soviet Union with a foreword by the leader of the world proletariat!
Averchenko died not at all old in Prague emigration, retaining to the end both his love for the Motherland and his rejection of the regime of terror. But he could have become a “proletarian writer” like his other comrades in the literary workshop and flourished in fame and prosperity...
The artist and writer Evgeny Bukovetsky was in Odessa. One of the founders of the Union of South Russian Artists. In his hospitable mansion on Knyazheskaya Street, the literary and artistic elite not only of Odessa, but of all of Russia gathered. His friend, the great Ivan Bunin, who lived through the horrors of the Civil War here and wrote his “Cursed Days,” left this house forever. But Bukovetsky did not want to leave his native and beloved city. He lived his whole life in an apartment left to him by the new government in his own house, divided into communal apartments. And he was not afraid to directly and impartially say what he thought, even during repressions. But no one reported on the old artist! And when the Romanian occupiers offered him to return the house, he proudly replied: “You didn’t take it from me, it’s not for you to return it!”
There were people, and there still are. Not all Odessa residents openly say that today the city lives under occupation. But very few of the recently famous and popular ones made a deal with their conscience, if they even had one.
All these “Masks”, Khaits and other Goppas and Filimonovs, of course, do not hold a candle to those about whom I told you a little. After all, God punishes people who make their gift an object of speculation, or even prostitution. And small, local talents turn into big mediocrities. The little people who gained fleeting fame and popularity thanks to the farce of Odessa humor and its imitation, wanted to stay afloat at any cost. At the cost of betraying your city. At the price of lackeyness before the executioners.
But Odessa not only has a broad soul, but also a good memory. And I still think that not a single real Odessa resident will go to their concerts now. Dancing on bones has never been in fashion here. And the fake “peacekeepers” have a direct route to tour the villages of Galicia. Maybe there they will also be served a couple of pieces of yesterday’s hominy. We don’t eat this in Odessa!
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