Security forces conduct a search of the director who called Russia a “beggar gopnik”
The search is taking place at the apartment of the chief director of the Moscow Gogol Center Theater (formerly the Gogol Theater) Kirill Serebryannikov. The searches are taking place as part of a criminal case initiated back in 2015 regarding a large theft (about 1 million rubles) in the Department of Culture of the Moscow government. Security forces' cars were also spotted directly near the Gogol Center building.
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Serebryannikov was appointed director of the theater in 2012 without the necessary competition. The team did not accept the new leader and sought his dismissal.
Serebyannikov is a laureate of several international and Russian theater and film awards.
Without waiting for official reports, liberal media and bloggers are already whipping up hysteria, interpreting the searches as persecution of a free-thinking director.
“This is the first time when they came for the creative intelligentsia. Literally after the creation of the Russian Artistic Union, which declared a crusade against liberal culture,” wrote Echo of Moscow journalist Ksenia Larina on Facebook.
It is obvious that in the future the investigation of the theft case will be interpreted by the liberal intelligentsia as “atrocities of the regime.” Serebryannikov’s biography gives grounds to qualify him as a fighter against the system.
The director supported Georgia in the 2008 conflict, signed letters in defense of Pussy Riot, against the Dima Yakovlev law, and restrictions on LGBT rights. He organized démarches not only in Russia, but also, for example, at the Cannes Film Festival.
In a 2014 interview, the director called Russia “a country of unabolished slavery.” According to Serebrennikov, “Russia is now behaving like a beggar who has gone crazy with grief.” However, all this did not prevent him from successfully running the theater.
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