ONE HOUR AND EIGHTEEN MINUTES

The performance is dedicated to the memory of Sergey Magnitskiy, the lawyer of Firestone Duncan company, who died in prison called "Matrosskaya Tishina" on November 16, 2009, at the age of 37. His name is known around the world now --- it became a symbol of callousness and judicial tyranny, so characteristic of modern Russia. "One hour eighteen (minutes)" is the time the lawyer, Sergey Magnitskiy, spent locked up in a cell, and then his heart stopped. The director, Mikhail Ugarov, chose the way of reconstructing a possible trial of those who had brought Magnitskiy to death: "the trial which never took place, but should and will". Letters and diaries of Sergey Magnitskiy and also the report of the Moscow public supervisory commission were used as a basis for the script. All the characters are given the names of real people involved in the case of Magnitskiy. The action consists of monologues pronounced by alleged "defendants" —the judge who did not give a glass of boiling water to Magnitskiy, the prison doctor, who failed to give him medical assistance, the investigator, who ignored his complaints, a couple of indifferent paramedics, who did not notice the murder happening next to them, and another judge, who extended Magnitskiy's detention four days before his death. Neither the director, nor the audience have any doubts regarding the verdict of guilty. The villains in this performance, not typical for the apolitical modern Russian theatre, are even refused to look like real people.

The director by no means shares the opinion that not separate individuals but the entire system is to blame.

Roman Doljansky