Arsen Khandzhyan

Roma is Russian-Armenian. He is studying to be a lawyer but does not want to be a lawyer, he tells his parents that he goes to college, but he works in a pizzeria, he tells a friend that he likes Natasha, but this is not true. Once he meets Lesha, and everything in life takes on meaning: study, friendship, relationships with relatives and friends. Everything in life becomes important with love.

Yury Butusov’s final Moscow production is this multi-award-winning work based on Nikolai Gogol’s “Government Inspector.” The play deftly delves into the dual impossibilities of both accepting reality and escaping from it. As with many of Butusov’s stagings, chaos and pathos are seamlessly interwoven, with art presented as both freeing and healing.