The LDPR shamed the “cultural community”
State Duma deputy from the LDPR faction Mikhail Degtyarev believes that the “cultural community” is in too much of a hurry to defend the chief director of the Moscow Gogol Center theater, Kirill Serebrennikov, whose home was searched yesterday as part of an investigation into an embezzlement case.
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“If an artistic director, a popular person, works with budget money, he is under close attention of the state. Why is there such hysteria over the fact that a famous director was called in for questioning? It is incorrect for some representatives of the cultural community to label our law enforcement agencies. The investigation is ongoing, there are questions, they will be asked. If a person is not guilty of anything, then there will be no charges,” Degtyarev said.
He recalled that all questions to the Russian Academy of Sciences were removed after the functions of economic and scientific management were separated. Degtyarev believes that the same needs to be done in theaters.
Searches in the capital's Gogol Center theater and Serebrennikov's house took place the previous morning as part of a case of theft of public funds (200 million rubles) by the management of the non-profit organization Seventh Studio, the founder of which was the director. After the searches, Serebrennikov was interrogated as a witness and then released. His lawyers have no complaints against the investigators.
However, the liberal public interprets investigative actions as persecution of an opposition cultural figure. A group of famous Russian artists and directors issued an open letter in defense of Serebrennikov.
Kirill Serebrennikov supported Georgia in the 2008 conflict, signed letters in defense of Pussy Riot, against the Dima Yakovlev law, and restrictions on LGBT rights. He staged demarches 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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