The premiere of the lyric opera by Pyotr Tchaikovsky “Iolanta” took place on May,17^th  at the Moscow theater “Helikon-Opera”.

The premiere director was the laureate of the 2015 Nano-Opera Young Opera Directors Contest Sergei Novikov. “Iolanta” is his fourth production, despite the fact that Novikov’s opera is just a hobby: he has been in the civil service for a long time, and since June 2018 has been the head of the presidential administration’s department for public projects.

Novikov presented to the audience his own interpretation of Tchaikovsky’s work, which, according to him, differs from other “often static” productions. And although the director moved the action from the depths of the Middle Ages to the modern world of digital technologies, and Iolanta’s entourage presented him as an idle public taking selfies and engaged in self-admiration, he still managed, in the eyes of critics, to keep the main idea of ​​the creators of the opera. And most importantly,  Novikov did not violate the integrity of a classic work one iota.