Arts & entertainment news (1,678)

Kirkorov clashes with TV crew

Pop singer Filipp Kirkorov found himself in the midst of a new scandal last week, when journalists of the national channel NTV filed a complaint accusing the singer of verbally insulting them and breaking a $25,000 video camera, Gazeta.ru reported. The incident took place when Kirkorov was approached by the NTV crew after a performance at the Roll-Hall entertainment centre in Moscow and was asked "provocative" questions, as he put it, regarding a pending lawsuit filed against Kirkorov by Yury Larionov, deputy general director of the Tatar State Opera and Ballet Theatre in Kazan. Larionov is pressing charges against Kirkorov for an alleged verbal assault during the singer's show at the theatre last March. Kirkorov's spokesperson said the TV journalists confronted the singer "in an aggressive way", provoking his reaction, while an anonymous witness quoted by Gazeta.ru said the reporters' behaviour was polite. A day later, Kirkorov's spokesperson said NTV's complaint had been withdrawn, while the TV station declined to comment, RIA Novosti reported.

Eurovision winner accused of plagiarism

Eurovision Song Contest winner Alexander Rybak is facing copycat accusations. A controversy involving Rybak, a Norwegian citizen born in Minsk, arose when TV host Vladimir Molchanov claimed there was a suspicious similarity between one of the songs performed by Rybak and one written by his father, Soviet composer Kirill Molchanov, shoowbiz.ru reported. According to the report, the song "Abandoned", which was not included in the Russian version of Rybak's debut album "Fairytales" but is on the album in some other countries, sounds very much like Kirill Molchanov's "Zhuravlinaya Pesnya" ("Crane Song") from the 1968 movie "Dozhivyom do Ponedelnika" ("We'll Live Till Monday"). Molchanov Jr. said he had been approached by someone interested in the rights to this song, but never granted rights to perform it to anyone.

Ancient towns and rural dreams (6,164)

Phoebe Taplin

An estimated quarter of a million visitors a year make their way to Leo Tolstoy's country estate at Yasnaya Polyana, 200 kilometres south of Moscow. Far fewer people stop off and enjoy the intervening towns and villages - and those who don't are missing out. There are art galleries, armouries and nature reserves waiting to be discovered in and around ancient Serpukhov, with its ruined Kremlin, and bustling Tula, home of the samovar and gingerbread factories.

The painter Vasily Polenov built his dream house - half studio, half abbey - on the banks of the wide river Oka and wrote to Ivan Tsvetayev (father of the poet Marina Tsvetayeva): "The light is wondrous; I've been dreaming of it all my life and now I can hardly believe this has come true."

Serpukhov

One hundred kilometres south of Moscow, the town of Serpukhov has stood on the Nara River since medieval times. Under Prince Vladimir the Bold, whose statue stands near the railway station, the people of Serpukhov helped to defeat the Golden Horde at the battle of Kulikovo in 1380. The streets are lined with wooden houses, stone mansions and picturesque churches. The Vysotsky Monastery at the south end of the old town gets its name from the tall bank above the river on which it was built. At the other end of town, the white walls of the kremlin were raided to provide stone for the Moscow metro. The kremlin is now a green hill, crowned and surrounded by churches.

History and Art Museum

In a rose pink mansion on Ulitsa Chekhova, Serpukhov's art gallery (open Tue.-Sun. 10 am-5 pm) is one of the finest in the Moscow area. The house belonged to Anna Marayeva, a textile merchant's widow, and the rooms are preserved in all their turn-of-the-century splendour. The architect was Roman Klein, who built the Pushkin Fine Art Museum in Moscow. Marayeva also commissioned the red brick Old Believer's church next door. The museum's collection includes dappled forests by Shishkin and lonely bogatyrs by Vasnetsov. Illarion Pryanishnikov's "Waiting for the Best Man" is a brilliantly composed conversation piece in which the plump, relaxed matchmaker in red silk contrasts with the nervous bride.

Prioksky Terrasny Nature Reserve

The Oka River National Park near Serpukhov, founded in 1948 to protect the rare plant life of the marshy forests, is now a UNESCO biosphere. Most of the park is off-limits to tourists, but you can visit the bison reserve with a guide to see these prehistoric giants roaming through the woods. There is also a small museum with stuffed and dusty dioramas of the other local wildlife, including beavers and badgers, wild cats and capercaillies. A tour costs 150 roubles per person and the last one starts around 3 pm daily - quite a good time to visit as the bison start to come closer to the fences in anticipation of feeding time. One guide, Marina, speaks English. Phone (4967) 70-71-45 to book.

Tula

Eighty kilometres further on, this large industrial city still has a nine-towered 16th-century kremlin at its centre. The brick walls enclose the Uspensky Cathedral and the popular armoury museum, full of imperial swords and ornate rifles. Tula's traditional industries make weaponry, samovars and gingerbread. There are museums dedicated to each of these and souvenirs on every corner.

Yasnaya Polyana

With the 100th anniversary of Tolstoy's death coming up next year, there is no chance of anyone forgetting about the great writer any time soon. The simple house and sprawling gardens at Yasnaya Polyana are a monument to the man whose philosophy inspired Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King. Leo Tolstoy was born on this estate in 1828 and lived his last years there too.

"Without my own Yasnaya Polyana, I can scarcely imagine Russia and my relation to it," he wrote.

The direct train from Moscow each weekend arrives at the Lev Tolstoy memorial station, which has an exhibition hall. A shuttle bus transfers you to the estate, where you can wander through the orchards he planted, past the bench he sat on, to the simple grassy mound where he is buried - but to get inside Tolstoy's house, you have to be part of a tour group. Reverential excursions (in Russian) cost 150 roubles, taking in the local schoolhouse and other sights of interest.

Polenovo

Only a fraction of the number of visitors who shuffle through the vine-covered porch at Yasnaya Polyana find their way to the beautiful estate at Polenovo. The houses and gardens of the painter Vasily Polenov are between Serpukhov and Tula, near the town of Tarusa. Polenov designed the main house, neighbouring studio and landscape gardens himself and lived there for nearly 40 years. The mansion was built in 1892 with the money he got from selling his painting "Christ and the Sinner", sketches of which can be seen on the first floor.

Both inside and out, the houses are reminiscent of the artists' colony at Abramtsevo, where Polenov also lived when he first married. Paintings by Repin, Kramskoi, Surikov and Levitan fill every space on the walls along with Polenov's own art. He died there in 1927 and was buried near the local church. Just over 10 years later, the estate first opened as a museum (open Wed.-Sun. 11 am-4 pm, 100 roubles to visit both buildings). It has a beautifully maintained park, a café, diorama display and great views of the river. Polenov first discovered the area when he was sailing along the Oka. "The landscapes... are beautiful," he wrote. "I wish we could settle there".

How to get there

Serpukhov, Tarusa and Tula are all accessible from Moscow's Kursky railway station on the "elektrichka" trains. There are three express trains a day to Serpukhov which take an hour and a half.

At weekends, a special train with carriages named after Tolstoy's novels runs directly to Yasnaya Polyana estate. It leaves Moscow at 9.10 am every Saturday and Sunday morning and departs for the return journey at 6.10 pm, reaching Kursky station three hours later.

Alternatively, from Yasnaya Polyana you can catch various buses and "marshrutka" minibuses back to Tula from the nearby Shekino-Tula highway. Simply cut up the hill through the Soviet-era school (founded by Tolstoy's daughter), almost opposite the estate, to reach the main road.

There are infrequent buses (the 41 and the 105 respectively) from Serpukhov to the Bison reserve or from Tarusa to Polenov's estate, but it's simpler to get a taxi (about 250-300 roubles in each case).

Where to stay and eat

The old Hotel Rus in Serpukhov (2/20 2nd Moskovskaya Ulitsa, 4976 76-09-97) has a long tradition of hospitality. A comfortable triple room with breakfast costs 2,850 roubles. The best thing about staying here is that the hotel's restaurant, the fabulous Postoyaly Dvor, has its own micro-brewery producing three different real ales. A pint costs 80 roubles.

For a change from Russian cuisine, the Pazzo Pizzeria at 130a Ul. Voroshilova does very reasonable pizzas in a relaxed atmosphere.

There are numerous hotels and restaurants in Tula. One of the newest top-end offerings is the History Hotel, out in the eastern suburbs (24 Ulitsa Shukhova, 4872 41-93-23). A two-room suite (sleeps three) costs 4,000 roubles.

The wood-cabin Preshpekt Café opposite the entrance to Yasnaya Polyana is a great pit-stop for hungry Tolstoy fans. The walls are hung with patchwork quilts and the daily business lunch is a bargain.