Adrian Ivanovich Piotrovsky (Russian:Адриа́н Ива́нович Пиотро́вский) (20 November [O.S. 8 November] 1898 – 21 November 1937) was a Russian Sovietdramaturge, responsible for creating the synopsis forSergei Prokofiev's balletRomeo and Juliet. He was the "acknowledged godfather" of theWorkers' Youth Theatre (Teatr Rabochey Molodyozhi: TRAM).[1]
The illegitimate son of the prominent Polish classicistTadeusz Stefan Zieliński, Piotrovsky became Zielinski’s pupil and made scholarly translations of classical Greek plays.[2] He was strongly influenced by Zielinski’s campaign to revive open-air Greek theatre, which would directly inspire Piotrovsky’s involvement in street theatre in the years following the October Revolution.
Piotrovsky also became a pupil and disciple of the theatre directorVsevolod Meyerhold,[3] and for a while worked with Meyerhold in the Theatrical department ofNarkompros (the Commissariat of Enlightenment under the leadership ofAnatoly Lunacharsky), teaching classes in Meyerhold’s "Courses in the Mastery of Staging";[4] but by the 1920s he had distanced himself from Meyerhold's theatre.[3] By this time he had become a close friend and colleague of the theatre director Sergei Radlov (who was also a disciple of Zielinski's), and in 1919 their first collaborative project,The Battle of Salamis (a play intended for schoolchildren), was staged under Radlov's direction.[5]
By 1919 Piotrovsky was a member of the Petrograd formalist groupOPOJAZ,[6] and he wrote and directed plays at the People's Comedy Theatre (Teatr Narodnoy Komedii).[7] In spite of his interest in popular and street theatre, he also displayed certain elitist tendencies, arguing in an article entitled "Dictatorship," published in October 1920, that state control of the arts was necessary, since otherwise the arts would become prey to both the "petty shopkeeper" and the "man on the street."[8]
He taught in the Division for the History and Theory of the Theatre (founded in 1920) at the State Institute for the History of the Arts (GIII).[9] He was closely associated withTRAM, acting as its principle ideologue. By 1930 the theatre was under attack, accused of "formalism" by its critics from among journalists and rival proletarian organizations.[10] In May 1931 Piotrovsky's playRule, Britannia was staged with music byDmitri Shostakovich.[10]
Piotrovsky became artistic director of theLeningrad Film Studio.[11] In 1934 he met Prokofiev, and suggested to him the subject ofRomeo and Juliet for a ballet.[12] After Prokofiev had drafted an original treatment of the story, it was further worked upon by Piotrovsky and Sergei Radlov.[13]
On 6 February 1936 Piotrovsky was attacked in aPravda editorial, "Balletic Falsehood", for his libretto, written in collaboration withFyodor Lopukhov, of the balletThe Limpid Stream (with music by Shostakovich).[14] He was arrested by theNKVD in July 1937, sentenced to death and shot on 21 November.[15]
Adrian Piotrovsky was rehabilitated in July 1957.
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