After only a few days the wildest and deepest production about meaning and determination for life will have its 100-th performance. On 16th December the National Theatre will present "Life Is Beautiful" at full house, as it has been since the premiere. 

       "The Suicide" is most probably the play that faced the communist censorship the longest - 60 years of ultimate ban. The text was written in 1928 and first staged in 1987 in the USSR. It is often called "'The Government Inspector' of the XX-th century". Meyerhold, Stanislavsky, Lunacharsky, Gorky and Bulgakov all unite in support of "The Suicide" but all efforts prove to be futile. Erdman wrote the play at the age of 28 and it is his last play. In 1933 he is exiled in Eniseisk for "counterrevolutionary literary works" and later released under special regime - he is deprived of his right to establish in any of the 10 big cities in the USSR, including Moscow. The play was first staged in Russia several years after Erdman's death.

As if we're doing anything to fight revolution! Since its day 1 we do nothing - we simply go to each other's homes and complain how difficult life is. Because it's easier for us to live constantly complaining from living a difficult life. Whispering, at that! Comrades, I beg you from the name of millions of people - lend us the right to whisper. You won't even hear it, busying with construction work. We will spend our whole lives whispering. 

~ Podsekalnikov