Andrei Kureichik Explained

Andrei Kureichik
Birth Place:Minsk, Belarus
Occupation:Film director, screenwriter, playwright
Awards:Independent literary award "Debut",[1] prize of the jury of the Russian professional film production award "CUT!"

Andrei Kureichik (Belarusian Андрэй Уладзіміравіч Курэйчык; born January 14, 1980) is a Belarusian screenwriter, playwright, director, and publicist.[2]

Biography

Kureichik was born in Minsk. In his youth, he was trained by his father in Wushu and won the Minsk championship in 1992.[3] He graduated from BSU Lyceum[4] and then continued his studies at Belarusian State University (BSU) School of Law. As a sophomore at BSU, he had multiple part-time jobs, including scanning fingerprints in a forensic center and working in a law firm. Kureichik graduated from BSU with honors,[5] specializing in administrative law and political science. He further completed the postgraduate program at BSU Department of Journalism[6] and the film director's internship at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater (2002) under the supervision of Oleg Tabakov, the People's Artist of the USSR.[7]

From 2001 to 2002, Kureichik worked as a lawyer at Vlasova and Partners,[8] an international law firm. He was also an assistant to the chairman of the Belarusian Union of Theater Workers fulfilling the responsibilities of press secretary and head of multiple art projects. Since 2002, he has authored over 150 articles as a commentator at Belorusskaya Gazeta, a top weekly political and economic newspaper. Kureichik also served as editor-in-chief of the National Television (ONT) and was on the creative team of the sociopolitical talk show Choice.

When he was 21, his play Paradise Lost was staged at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater. Paradise Lost, as directed by Kureichik himself, next opened on the stage of the Yanka Kupala National Academic Theater on 9 November 2002. On 21 June 2003, the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater hosted another premiere under Kureichik's direction, The Piedmont Beast, which was one of the winners in the contemporary play competition [9] established by Oleg Tabakov together with the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation. This play was later staged in many other theaters, including at the Mayakovsky Theatre in Moscow. From 2007 to 2020, Kureichik worked as a screenwriter in the cinema industry.

In 2003, he worked as an editor of Hotel of Desires Fulfillment, the first Belarusian television series. The Center for Contemporary Drama and Directing was founded by Kureichik within the Belarusian State Academy of Arts; the Center produced several performances and events.[10] As an art director, he also established the International Festival of Contemporary Theater Open Format,[11] the largest theater festival in Belarus.[12]

In 2004, Kureichik completed an internship for managing non-profit organizations that was sponsored by the US Department of State. He was the artistic director of Diva Belaya Rus, a commercial festival of Belarusian women that was held at the Palace of the Republic, and he was invited to teach theatrical disciplines at the BSU Lyceum.[13] Later, he created the radio program Theatrical Intermission with Andrei Kureichik on the national radio Culture and taught at the directing department of the Russian Academy of Theater Arts GITIS.[14] In 2006, he was editor-in-chief of the Vestnik Kultury newspaper.

In 2007, Kureichik moved from Minsk, Belarus, to the village where his parents came from, near Smilovichi, and wrote the script for the film Love-Carrot-2. In 2010, he returned to Minsk with his family. His wife, Olga, was an actress at the Kupalov Theater and she performed in Memorial Prayer, Pavlinka, and several other performances. In 2012, with Dmitry Friga, Director Dmitry Marinin, and cameramen Alexei Korneev, Artyom Yakimov, and Nikita Pinigin, he founded the creative group Bez Buslou Arts.

By the age of 30, Kureichik had written 25 plays that were staged in 9 countries.[15] By the age of 35, he had completed 15 film projects.[16] Kureichik is a member of the Belarusian Literary Union Polotsk Branch and is on the jury of the literary prize committee named after Simeon Polotsky.[17] He is a member of the Republican Public Council for Culture and Arts under the Council of Ministers. The total revenue generated from the films with his scripts amounted to 62 million dollars.[18]

Kureichik gives master classes in different countries. He has also taught screenwriting at several universities in Russia, Belarus, and Lithuania.[16]

In May 2020, during the 2020 Belarusian Presidential election campaign, he proposed a plan for changing the government without an election and a revolution.[19] His suggestion to Viktor Babariko, one of the candidates for the presidency of the Republic of Belarus, was to create an organization or a party that would unite supporters of political change during the presidential election campaign.[20] He was active in the 2020-2021 Belarusian protests which followed the scandalous presidential campaign which, by all reliable accounts, ended with the resounding defeat of the incumbent president Alexander Lukashenko, although Lukashenko defied everyone and crushed any attempts to remove him from power.[21] On 17 August 2020, Kureichik became a member of the core committee of the Coordination Council to ensure the transfer of power in the Republic of Belarus.[22] Kureichik, "slipped out of Belarus into Ukraine under the threat of arrest in mid-September 2020. He spent the next six-to-nine months living out of a suitcase. His wanderings took him from Ukraine, Sweden and Tanzania to Slovakia, where he finally received a Schengen visa for Europe, then on to Finland where he was given shelter for a year by an organization called Artists at Risk.[23] In the spring of 2022 he spent two months at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign as the George A. Miller Visiting Artist, and in the fall he completed a semester tenure in the Maurice R. Greenberg World Fellows Program at Yale University, before accepting a position as lecturer at Yale in January 2023."[24]

In September 2020 Kureichik completed his play, Insulted. Belarus which gave rise to the Insulted. Belarus Worldwide Readings Project. He added the play Voices of the New Belarus in the summer of 2021. Both plays were made into award-winning films by actor-director Oksana Mysina, and, overall, the plays were given over 200 staged readings or full productions in 30 countries and 21 languages. Insulted. Belarus had its full-production U.S. premiere at City Garage Theater in Santa Monica, CA, running from Nov. 17 to Dec. 17, 2023.[25] Insulted. Belarus and Voices of the New Belarus were translated by John Freedman and published in a volume titled Two Plays of Revolution by Laertes Press in the United States in 2023.[26]

Kureichik was a 2022 Maurice R. Greenberg World Fellow at Yale University, and, as of February 2024, was a Fortunoff Fellow and Henry Hart Rice Associate Research Scholar and Lecturer at Yale University.

In August 2021, Kureichik received direct death threats from agents of Lukashenko regime.[27] [28]

Kureichik's latest play, Insulted. Planet (written in Russian) was debuted in a staged reading in Finnish translation at the Finnish National Theatre on 23 September 2023. [29]

Filmography

Director and screenwriter

Films (actor)

Plays

Awards

External links

Bibliography

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Andrey Kureichik . https://web.archive.org/web/20101017071715/http://www.pokolenie-debut.ru/lica_premii/k/andrej_kurejchik/ . dead . 2010-10-17 . Faces of the award . Humanitarian Fund "Generation" . 2010-12-17.
  2. Web site: Belarusian playwright may be accused of attempting to seize power . Melnichuk Т.. 2020-08-20 . . 2020-08-20.
  3. Web site: 2011-01-28. Conquer Hollywood. 2015-10-31. TUT.BY.
  4. Web site: BSU Lyceum .
  5. Web site: Belokhvostik N.. 2009-04-22. Kureichik will become a Hollywood foreign worker. 2015-10-31. Komsomolskaya Pravda.
  6. Web site: The script of the Russian film was written by a Belarusian. 2021-01-25. Russian Newspaper. 8 April 2015 . ru.
  7. Web site: 2011-06-09. Letters to a Minsk friend. The eighth letter. About Natalia Stezhko…. https://web.archive.org/web/20150324143740/https://www.naviny.by/rubrics/opinion/2011/06/09/ic_articles_410_173948/. 2015-03-24. 2015-10-31. usurped. BelaPAN.
  8. Web site: Vlasova Mikhel & Partners - legal services in Belarus. en.vmp.by.
  9. Web site: 2003-06-24 . Piedmont Beast. Moscow Art Theater named after AP Chekhov. Press about the play . Theatrical caretaker . 2015-10-31.
  10. Web site: 2003-03-06. Minsk will host the Center for Contemporary Drama. 2015-10-31. Belarusian business newspaper.
  11. Web site: 2003-05-17. Belokhvostik N.. Andrey Kureichik has established a new theater award. 2021-01-25. kp.by.
  12. News: Khoroshilova. Т.. 2015-04-08. Cotton beard. 2015-10-31. Rossiyskaya Gazeta.
  13. Web site: Andrei Kureichik. 2021-01-25. www.proficinema.ru. ru.
  14. Belokhvostik N. . Kureichik fled to a village near Minsk to write "Love-carrot-2" . newspaper . Komsomolskaya pravda in Belarus . Minsk . 29 May 2008. BelKP-PRESS .
  15. Web site: KRIVEC. Natalia. 2010-12-23. Playwright Andrei KUREICHIK: "After an hour of playing with my son, I feel like I have worked a day at a plant". 2021-01-25. kp.by.
  16. Web site: 2015-01-27. Snezhina А.. Director Andrei Kureichik: Belarus has its own way. 2021-01-25. Telegraf.by. ru-RU.
  17. Web site: POLOTSK BRANCH HONORS LAUREATES - January 3, 2012 - Blog - Personal site. 2021-01-25. slavtraditions.ucoz.ru.
  18. News: Kureichik A.. 2012-08-27. Letters to a Minsk friend. The 13th letter. About the death of hopes…. naviny.by.
  19. Web site: "Kureichik's plan": how to change the government without elections and revolutions?. 2021-01-25. Belarus news euroradio.fm. 25 May 2020 . ru.
  20. Web site: Director Kureichik addressed Babaryka with a proposal to form an organization. 2021-01-25. Novy Chas.
  21. Astapenia, Ryhor, "What Belarusians Think About their Country's Crisis," 21 October 2020. Chatham House.
  22. Web site: Tikhanovskaya's headquarters published a list of people who are members of the council for the transfer of power . . 2020-08-17 . 2020-08-17 . 2020-08-18 . https://web.archive.org/web/20200818224544/https://interfax.by/news/policy/raznoe/1281143/ . dead .
  23. Web site: Lukašenkan terrori yltää myös Suomeen - Helsinkiin poliittista vainoa paennut käsikirjoittaja ilmoitti supolle tappouhkauksista . . 2021-08-07 . 2021-08-07.
  24. Freedman, John, "Two Plays Against Tyranny" in Two Plays of Revolution. Insulted. Belarus and Voices of the New Belarus (Laertes Press, 2023), p. 8. This introduction is available online on the publisher's website.
  25. Web site: Insulted. Belarus – City Garage Theatre .
  26. Web site: Two Plays of Revolution .
  27. Web site: 2021-08-06. AR-Resident Andrei Kureichik Receiving Direct Death Threats from Agents of Lukashenko Regime. 2021-08-10. Artists at Risk (AR). en-US.
  28. Web site: admin. Lukashenko's terror also reaches Finland – Screenwriter fleeing political persecution in Helsinki informs Supo of death threats – Foreign. 2021-08-10. en-US.
  29. Web site: Loukatut. Planeetta. .
  30. Web site: "Three Giselles" at the New Drama Theater . "Komsomolskaya pravda "in Belarus . 2013-01-16.
  31. Web site: How to become immortal . 2014-11-12 . Donetsk Regional Russian Drama Theater . 2014-11-12.
  32. Web site: . 2017-10-28 . "Offended". Tough and sincere . . 2020-09-27 . be.
  33. Web site: Comedy genre is one of the most difficult in theater. 2017-11-28. TUT.BY. 2017-11-28. 2017-12-01. https://web.archive.org/web/20171201035329/https://afisha.tut.by/news/anews/570637.html. dead.
  34. News: 2017-11-21 . A performance about Count Muravyov-Amursky based on the play by Andrey Kureichik was staged in Khabarovsk . BelaPAN .
  35. Web site: Igolinsky D. . 2018-10-04 . Swinging at "Admiral Nevelskoy" . . 2018-10-24.
  36. Web site: 2019-03-24 . RTBD will show Andrey Kureichik's comedy "Gender Freaks" . . 2019-05-06.
  37. Web site: Hrushetsky A. . 2020-09-14 . Kureichik wrote a play about the Belarusian peaceful revolution . Novy Chas . 2020-09-27 . be.
  38. Web site: Belarusians took third place in the International Festival of Literature and Culture "Slavic Traditions - 2011" . News of Euroregions . Euroregions of Belarus . 2011-11-21 . 2012-07-19 . https://archive.today/20120719092602/http://www.beleuroregion.by/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=515:-q-2011q&catid=44:2010-08-10-11-58-05&Itemid=59&lang=ru . dead .
  39. Web site: Belokhvostik N.. Andrey Kureichik secretly made the author's version of "Above the Sky". Culture. Komsomolskaya pravda in Belarus. 2012-04-08. 2012-12-08. https://archive.today/20121208161337/http://www.kp.by/daily/25875/2839683/. live.
  40. Web site: 2012-06-20. Kureichik received an award for the project "Above the Sky". https://web.archive.org/web/20120622125741/http://www.belaruspartisan.org/life/213382/. dead. 2012-06-22. 2012-08-27.
  41. News: The results of the XVIII Comedy Film Festival were summed up in Tula . Shulepova Е. . 2017-10-21 . Rossiyskaya Gazeta. 2017-10-11. https://web.archive.org/web/20171024042718/https://rg.ru/2017/10/21/reg-cfo/festival-kinokomedij.html . 2017-10-24. Alt URL
  42. Web site: Grushetsky O.L.. 2019-07-05. The play by the Belarusian playwright became the best at the international festival in Odessa. Novy Chas. 2020-05-29. be.

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