The play based on Chernyshevsky's novel is a kind of seminar or debate: the stage of the Bolshoi Drama Theater turns into a lecture hall, and the auditorium becomes a classroom. Director Andrei Moguchy admits that the main theme of the novel, written by Nikolai Chernyshevsky in the 1860s in the dungeons of the Peter and Paul Fortress, has not lost its relevance for him. And although much in the novel now seems naive and implausible, and the work itself has acquired utopian qualities, the central theme remains one that concerns the modern person - the theme of freedom. The heroine of the novel, Vera Pavlovna, boldly asserts her right to freedom: the freedom to act according to her own will, freedom from imposed obligations that would not constrain others. Is freedom that does not infringe on the freedom of others real? This question becomes central for Moguchy and his troupe. You can find more plays in St. Petersburg on our website in the theater section.