13 Jun A Sense of Direction – Polina Kalinina

Born in 1987, director Polina Kalinina spent the first ten years of her life in Russia, then the rest of her childhood in Bristol. She studied English at the University of Oxford, then completed a diploma in directing at LAMDA. After graduating, she worked as a trainee director at the Orange Tree Theatre, where she staged her first show, and as an associate director with the Actors Touring Company, with whom she travelled the world working on David Greig’s acclaimed play The Events.

As a director, Kalinina has staged Romeo and Juliet at Bristol’s Tobacco Factory and Playboy Of The Western World at Southwark Playhouse, and her current production of Anna Karenina – as adapted by Scottish actor and writer Lesley Hart – opened earlier this month at the Edinburgh Lyceum Theatre, before a transfer to Bristol Old Vic in early June. She has also worked extensively directing shows in drama schools – at Mountview Academy, at East15 Acting School, and at Guildhall.

How did you become a director?

I was in a production of The Crucible when I was at school, but I found acting really frustrating and I knew I didn’t want to do that. When I went to university, I discovered that there was more to theatre than just acting . I discovered that you could be a director instead, or a designer, or a sound designer, or something like that. I thought I’d have a go at directing The Crucible, and that was it.

I felt comfortable directing. We did some mad student stuff. We did The Crucible in a chapel. We did Hedda Gabler on a basketball court. We did some cabaret performances of Spring Awakening somewhere. It was so much fun. After that, I went off to LAMDA to train as a director.

Who or what was the biggest help along the way?

Stephen Jameson, who ran the directing course at LAMDA back then and went on to become principal of Mountview, was incredible. The things he taught me were really useful. Then, straight out of LAMDA, I got onto a trainee scheme at the Orange Tree Theatre. There was two of us. It paid badly, and we had to work front of house as well, but we assisted a lot. The Orange Tree is famous for new writing and undiscovered classics. And that is pretty much where I have landed, too.

What work are you most proud of?

I really love making shows in drama schools. I get a real kick out of doing shows at East 15, for example. They have an acting and stage combat course, so I get to work with actors who can do backflips and stuff, which is amazing.

Professionally, doing Romeo and Juliet with the Tobacco Factory in Bristol was brilliant. It was a great company and a great creative team, and the show had a really muscular energy to it.

What work are you least proud of?

I’ve done a couple of projects since coming back from maternity leave that have been really hard. I went back to work about four months after having my baby, and my head just was not quiet in the rehearsal room. I know I could have done better on those projects. I was physically there, but my head and my heart were with my baby. I am quite bad at compartmentalising in general.

Who – or what – is your biggest theatrical influence?

In terms of directors, I think Lyndsey Turner is smashing. I’ve never assisted her, but I’ve done workshops with her, and I think the way she works with actors is  just remarkable. In terms of creative stimuli, I like watching things I wouldn’t direct, like opera and ballet and musicals.

Is there a show that you really want to stage?

Titus Andronicus. It is about family and revenge and holding grudges. It has a real Succession vibe. Bar a couple of characters, everyone is hugely privileged and they are all at each other’s throats.

What is your financial situation?

I’ve worked in literary agencies. I’ve worked for an architecture firm as a personal assistant. I’ve run workshops. Tutoring has been a lifesaver over the years. When you are starting out, finding someone that will give you a job at short notice, then let you drop it to go off and do some theatre is really important. You have to find those people and hang on to them.

Now, I’m lucky because I have a partner that doesn’t have a precarious, freelancing jobs, so there is a safety net. I don’t know how I could make this work without that.

What do you enjoy most about directing?

When you direct, you have the overall vision, and then everyone takes puts their incredible talents to work at making it happen. You put the pieces on the board, and they go off and do loads of cool stuff. They sought out problems you didn’t know you had. They have ideas that you would never have had. But that only happens because you have brought everyone into the same room.

What are your frustrations with directing?

Time. There is never enough time. Also, I hate that first stagger through a show, when it is shit. You’ve worked on all the different bits, put it together, and it looks like Frankenstein’s monster.

What fills you with dread about the future of theatre?

The Conservative party. And having to fight for funding among ourselves, and getting frustrated and bitter and mean-spirited because of that. It is so difficult to be generous and creative when there is no money.

What gives you hope for the future of theatre?

New voices doing different things. That Katie Mitchell project where the show tours, but the company doesn’t – A Play For The Living In A Time Of Extinction. Anything that isn’t trad.

What are you working on at the moment?

Anna Karenina has opened in Edinburgh, and arrives in Bristol in early June. It has been adapted by Lesley Hart. We met working on David Greig’s The Events in 2015, and kept in contact. We started talking about adapting Anna Karenina in 2018. We wanted to adapt a big beast of a novel with juicy characters that we could really sink our teeth into, and Anna Karenina really appealed to us both.

I can speak Russian, so I translated chunks of the novel – not all of it! – and recorded voice notes that Lesley then wrote up and turned into a play. I don’t think our version is an accurate translation, necessarily, but hopefully it captures the spirit of the prose.

Staging Anna Karenina in the current climate is complicated. Of course, I think the war in Ukraine is a horrific abomination, and I think that Russia should and will face a reckoning for it. I also think Anna Karenina is not a glorification of Russia, like War and Peace. I think it is a domestic story about women, and is universal in that way. I also think our version has a lot more Scottishness than Russianness in it. Then, there is another angle to all this, which is that banning Tolstoy or Tchaikovsky plays into Russia’s propaganda. It adds fuel to their fire. It is such a complicated issue.

ENDS

Fergus Morgan is SDUKs resident blogger.