Pushkin “Eugene Onegin”
in our own words
Every Russian grows up learning the story of Eugene Onegin, Alexander Pushkin’s landmark novel in-verse. The work and its poetic images form a key part of the country’s national consciousness. In Pushkin “Eugene Onegin” in our own words, four immigrant Russians desperately try to communicate the value of an untranslatable classic to a New York audience. Why should we be made to care about the trials of a shallow Byronic hero, a too-deep teenage girl, and a less-than-successful birthday party? In the face of wartime atrocity, is there still a place in today’s world for Dostoevsky, for Tchaikovsky, for Pushkin? Can beauty and intellect survive such horrors? And should it?
— Shari Perkins, Krymov Lab NYC Dramaturg
Pushkin “Eugene Onegin” in our own words was presented by La MaMa ETC as a workshop in 2022, and as a sold out mainstage production in the Ellen Stewart Theater in 2023. In 2024, it received an extended run at BRIC as part of the Under the Radar Festival.
“a magic-lantern show of anarchic games and tiny miracles”
— Sarah Holdren, Vulture
PRESS
Review: Vulture
“Krymov’s theater, in its truest form, is astonishingly light and yet full of gravity. It floats heavenwards while understanding, even celebrating, its own, and our own, ephemerality.”
Review: Theatermania
“a production that is inventive, resourceful, and gleefully irreverent in its treatment of this most sacred text of Russian literature.”
Review: New York Times
“…the constant interrogation of the source material, all the while reaching deep into its core and extracting the marrow — what makes us human.”
CREATIVE TEAM
Writer/Director: Dmitry Krymov
Cast: Natalie Battistone, Kwesiu Jones, Jeremy Radin, Jackson Scott, Elizabeth Stahlmann, Anya Zicer
Interpreter: Tatyana Khaikin
Dramaturg and Onegin Translator: Shari Perkins
Production Designer: Emona Stoykova
Lighting Designer: Krista Smith
Costume Designer: Luna Gomberg
Sound Designers: Kate Marvin, Patrick Dunning
Projection Designer: Yana Biryukova
Pupper Designer: Leah Ogawa
Second Puppet Designer: Luna Gomberg
Assistant Production Designer: Marie de Testa
Draper / Tailor: Heather Ann Milam
Puppet Fabricators: Pamela Floyd-Ogawa, Ka Yee Chen, Sean Devares, John Tsung, Wen-You Cai, Anastasia Mezhankskaya, Arina Kleparskaya
Technical Director: Anna Labykina
Swing Choreographer: Rachel McMullin
Producers: Tim Eliot & Tatyana Khaikin
Casting Director: Tatyana Khaikin
Photos by Steven Pisano & Bronwen Sharp