Vladimir Pankov’s production based on the brilliant work by Ilf and Petrov is a true picaresque novel based on the events of the decline of the NEP era. «The Golden Calf» is a reference to a biblical image symbolizing the destructive passion for profit, greed, and vanity, for which people are ready to sell their own souls. For the characters in this novel, the underground millionaire Koreyko becomes that «golden calf,» or rather, the «cash cow» — their source of easy money.
The title of the play features an ironic nickname for Ostap Bender — a charismatic charlatan who practices «honest ways of getting money.» The main character, portrayed by Anton Shagin, is an incorrigible dreamer whose main talent lies in his inner freedom, which starkly contrasts with the dull, mundane reality; he is «fed only by ideas.» Beneath the sharp satire lies a high social pathos: all the characters are, in their own way, obsessed with the desire for money; they lose their human face and stray from the true meaning of human life.
As always in sounddrama performances, the music in the production becomes an independent character, revealing an additional layer of meaning in the story and transforming the plot, familiar from school, into a parable about eternal human passions and vices. The musical composition of the performance is based on the jazz of the «roaring» twenties, Russian chanson, and, of course, original music.
