Russia's first professional improvisational theatre - hilarious, absurd, phantastic,unique and above all: russian.

In March 2004 Sergey Sobolev and Eugen Gerein met in the Café Zhili byli at the Nevskij Prospekt in St. Petersburg. That was the beginning of TEATR 05. It sounds like the story of Stanislavskij and Dnchenko. At that time it was the beginning of Moskow Art Theatre. Improv is a very young genre for Russia and it is the quest for their own style that makes the Russian team so interesting.

This group, a so-called Russian-German Theatre Laboratory, also starred at the World Championship Theatresports 2005 in Berlin. Eugen Gerein, Galina Zdhanova, Sergey Sobolev, and Gerd Baier (piano) will not only perform theatresports but will also present their longform Seychas.

Teatr 05 - Seychas (long form show)

The play takes place on two different levels. A real one goes with dialogues and actions and a second shows the sensations behind the human masks of the acting characters. It's a kind of subtext expressed by sounds and movements. The levels complement one another using the method of support and contrast. TEATR 05 here combines the Stanislawskij tradition of acting and the performing art of the Neo Avantegarde. This performance is appealing to all senses and after a while the audience will recognize that it understands Russian without ever learned the language.

Created by Teatr 05, Saint Petersburg, Russia

Workshops

Character Play

Central theme of this workshop, under the direction of Sergey Sobolev, is character play. For improvisation theatre it is very important that actors can transform quickly - without the thinking - into several characters and figures. However, because of the fact that actor have to react very quickly, characters often do not get enough depth. Sergey is using the Stnislavskij method. Main part of the workshop is about playing with the circumstances. For example: what do I see, what do I hear, what do I feel when I am near a lake. And how does my character to that?

Moments of Truth

A workshop of the Russian ensemble TEATR 05 under the direction of Eugen Gerein. This workshop is based on the methods of the Russiantheatremaster Nikolai Demidov. It is about the imperceptible crossing of the boundary between I-actor and I-figure, so to say the passageinto the circumstances (obstojatel' stva). The ease of Western improvtheatre will be combined with the Russian traditional Stanislavskij school. These techniques are an important tool for improv longforms.