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Mikhail Gorbachev (Julian Glover) contemplates his fate alongside his wife, Raisa (Isla Blair) |
Reliving the trials of Mikhail Gorbachev
THE PRESIDENT'S HOLIDAY
Hampstead Theatre
FOR two days in August 1991 Mikhail Gorbachev, the second most powerful man in the world, was suddenly and dramatically denied all connection to anyone outside his presidential summer dacha in the Crimea.
His wife Raisa kept a diary and Penny Gold has drawn on it for what is an absorbing two hours of significant Soviet history.
Gorbachev was on the point of announcing fundamental changes throughout the 16 republics which made up the USSR.
Here, his idealism and faith in that abstraction, “the people”, is endorsed by Raisa. Unexpectedly his vision is shattered.
The head of his personal security, Plekhanov, an old friend, gives the KGB side of the argument and warns him that his agenda is unrealisable and possibly could lead to the opposite – rampant capitalism and its attendant evils.
In the hands of Julian Glover, Isla Blair and Robert Demeger as the implacable voice of Stalinism, the evening never flags.
The KGB’s warnings were worrying, but Gorbachev refused to believe they were accurate.
Glover’s Gorbachev rages as he realises his impotence; a brave and touching characterisation of the man who, according to Gold, ultimately and unwittingly destroys everything he once believed in.
Isla Blair manages to make Raisa a believable woman, sophisticated but proud of her peasant roots.
This is a woman who knows she is in a deep and secure partnership; tender but resolute in the face of personal betrayal.
Boris Yeltsin, once their hope, became the gravedigger of Gorbachev’s dream. The President’s Holiday is a timely and intelligent chapter about our time. On the night I went, capitalism and the stock market shuddered with lack of confidence. People began whispering the word “Socialism” again.
Patrick Sandford’s direction and Robin Don’s set put the mark of authority on the extraordinary holiday which began in optimism and ended in profound confusion and devastating consequences for the Soviet Union.
Until February 16
020 7722 9301 |
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