Vsevolod Meyerhold
Vsevolod Emilevich Meyerhold (born Karl Kazimir Theodor Meyerhold) (1874 - 1940) was a Russian theatrical director, actor and theorist.
Meyerhold was born in Penza on 28 January (9 February) 1874 into the family of a Russian-German wine manufacturer Emil Meyerhold. After completing school in 1895 he began the study of law at the Moscow University which he never completed. On his 21st birthday, Meyerhold converted to Orthodox Christianity, and accepted "Vsevolod" as an Orthodox Christian name. His acting career began when he became a student of the Moscow Philharmonic Dramatic School under the guidance of Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko, co-founder of the Moscow Art Theatre where Meyerhold later served as an actor.
Having left the Moscow Art Theatre in 1902, Meyerhold indulged himself in a number of theatrical projects, acting both as a director / producer and actor. The numerous projects of Meyerhold served as an arena for experiment and creation of new staging methods. Meyerhold was one of the most fervent advocates of symbolism in theatre, especially when he worked as the chief producer of the Vera Kommisarzhevskaya drama theatre in 1906-1907.
Meyerhold continued his search for theatrical innovation in 1907-1917, while working with imperial theatres in St. Petersburg, introducing classical plays in an innovative manner, and staging works of controversial contemporary authors like Fyodor Sologub, Zinaida Gippius, and Alexander Blok. In their plays Meyerhold tried to return to acting in the principles of Commedia Dell'Arte, rethinking them for the contemporary theatrical reality. His theoretical concepts of the ?conditional theatre? were elaborated on in his book On Theatre in 1913.
The revolutions in 1917 made Meyerhold one of the most enthusiastic activists for the development of the new Soviet Theatre, joining the Bolshevik Party in 1918, taking up posts with the Theatrical Council of the Bolshevik Government, and finally opening his own theatre, the theatre that bears his name until now. Meyerhold fiercely confronted the principles of theatrical academism, claiming them incapable of finding a common language with the new reality. Meyerhold?s methods of scenic constructivism and Mayakovsky?s Mistery-Bouffe, Fernand Crommelynck's Le Cocu Magnifique, and Alexander Sukhovo-Kobylin?s Tarelkin?s Death. The actors participating in Meyerhold?s productions acted according to the principle of biomechanics, the system of actor training that was later taught in a special acting school created by Meyerhold.
Meyerhold?s works were proclaimed antagonistic and alien to the Soviet people in the beginning of the 1930s. His theatre was closed down in 1938, and a year later Meyerhold was arrested and imprisoned. The date of his death is unclear; some sources say he was executed on 2 February 1940. He was cleared of charges posthumously in 1955.
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