In 1908, physicist Sir Oliver Lodge hypothesized that ghosts are "the ghostly reflection of some kind of long tragedy in the past." Lodge suggested that powerful emotions can somehow become imprinted in the environment and subsequently be perceived by people with sufficient sensitivity. If so, theaters are houses filled with human emotions
By all accounts, London's theaters are full of ghosts. A famous theatrical ghost is the ghost of William Terris, the leading actor of the Adelphi Theater, who lived at the end of the 19th century. Adored by fans and critics, he caused fantastic envy of his mediocre colleague, actor Richard Prince.
On December 16, 1897, Prince stabbed Terris with a dagger just as the great artist was approaching the stage door. We heard Terris, dying in the arms of prima Jesse Milward, whisper: "I'll be back." Many argue that Terris kept his word. An inexplicable knocking came from his old dressing rooms, and, in addition, a strange light was seen there. It was said that the ghost was met not only in the theater, but also at the nearest metro station, Charing Cross, where he often waited for the last train. Detailed descriptions by eyewitnesses of his top hat, cloak and cane were true.
But as soon as they spoke to the phantom, he immediately disappeared.
Memories of Miss Marple
The actress Margaret Rutherford, who became famous as Miss Marple, told about meetings at the Haymarket Theater with the ghost of John Buxtone, who served as theater director until his death in 1879.
During a popular music revue at the Haymarket, the director was horrified to see a man right behind one of the artists, whom he initially took for a stage worker, accidentally confusing the exits from the wings. The director wanted to give orders to lower the curtain and remove the delinquent from the stage, but he seemed to melt into thin air. And then the director remembered that the man was wearing a long black tailcoat, and assumed that it was Buxtone's ghost.
House with devils
It is characteristic that ghosts are found in Moscow theaters. Not so long ago, even the Vesti program showed a story about the ghosts that live in the Pushkin Theater and near the Variety Theater.
In the 80s of the 19th century, another Pushkin Theater existed in Moscow, founded by actress Anna Brenko.
Vladimir Gilyarovsky recalled that this “house stood with broken windows and a collapsed roof. Then … devils lived in it. Passers-by at night heard the howling in the house, the rumble of rusty iron, sometimes bricks flew out into the street, and through the broken windows many saw a white ghost. This house was literally a few meters from the current Pushkin Theater. But the building of the new theater is not so simple either. The earliest information about him dates back to the time of Catherine II, in particular to 1779.
In 1914, a young director Alexander Tairov was looking for premises for his theater. His wife, actress Alisa Koonen, recalls: “Earlier, my attention was attracted here by a mansion with a beautiful ebony door. The house seemed deserted and mysterious. There was no light in the windows in the evenings. Tairov looked around the mansion and agreed that there was "something" in it. In December of the same year, the theater, called the Chamber Theater, was opened. But the church authorities objected to a theater in the immediate vicinity of the church of St. John the Evangelist. Osip Mandelstam recalled that Tairov and Koonen, who were planning to expand the theater at the expense of the neighboring church, tore off the vestments and threw icons on the floor. Be that as it may, in 1949, after several decades of success, Tairov was accused by the Soviet authorities of "aesthetics and formalism."
He passed away in a psychiatric hospital … Alisa Koonen, who was a leading theater actress and one of Stanislavsky's favorite students, cursed this scene. Once glancing into the once native walls, she was horrified to discover that in the place of the legendary director's office there is now … a toilet.
And next to the Variety Theater in the mansion, which is occupied by the Russian Institute of Cultural Studies, the ghost of Malyuta Skuratov wanders. The secretary of the director of the institute, doctor of art history, professor Kirill Razlogova said that she had repeatedly seen a formidable ghost. Most often, it appears on the lower floor, where the doors of the underground passages are located, once laid under the Moskva River to the Kremlin itself. The institute's security guards, who are on duty at night, cannot stand it for a long time: they either start drinking or quit. In short, not everyone can spend the night there.
What is not allowed and what is needed
The actors are generally terribly superstitious. They never talk about the performance before the premiere, they don't gnaw sunflower seeds in the theater (otherwise there will be no box office), they think that it is necessary to sit down on the script if you dropped it, they are afraid to play in the productions of Macbeth and The Master and Margarita, as well as the dead in the coffin. But, it turns out, you just need to pull yourself together, as the actress of the Moscow Art Theater Alla Tarasova did. Having met Stanislavsky's ghost in the theater hall, she was not frightened, but strictly asked: "What are you doing here, Konstantin Sergeevich?" He shook his finger at her and slowly melted into thin air.