The Hairdresser

A hairdresser’s parlour in a secluded but scenic corner of the earth where people go to have their hair cut. They do it with pleasure because the hairdresser is a charming person: she’s bursting with brightness and happiness. Sooner or later her clients open their hearts to her. The driver, the fireman and many others would like to date her, but they don’t win her favour. There’s someone else in the heart of this agile woman: she’s waiting for her lover to be released from prison. The man of her dreams, whom she has never ever seen. She fell in love with him through letters. She constructed an image of a man who will redeem her life, and she turned away from those who recognize her virtues and want to be with her. She cares little for things that are obvious or plausible, because the image within surpasses reality. Her life has one direction: counting down the days. She lives an enchanted life in a dream until the genie is unleashed from the prison-bottle.

Correspondence courses in love rarely let their students remain on cloud nine. The sweet couple goes out for a drive… After staging Ostrovsky’s The Storm, Victor Ryzhakov (director and theatre-pedagogue, a significant figure of contemporary Russian theatre, and the initiator of the theatre movement “Kislorod” [Oxygen]) continues the creative process that he began in the Csokonai Theatre with The Hairdresser, a play by the young Russian playwright, Sergey Medvedev.

It is the world premiere of The Hairdresser. The play is a product of contemporary Russian drama, which is in active demand nowadays. Despite its modern features, it is rooted in the Gogolian traditions. It is a mirror for the fate of ordinary people, but the pursuit of happiness and the writer’s dedication to the human right to love shines through the grotesque style of the play. 

One of the most distinct marks in Ryzhakov’s theatrical language is pain wrapped in love and brightness. He shifts the conflict between human desires and the sober facts to a level of poetic visions that can inspire people of any age to pay condolence and reconsider what matters in life.