Director – Raimundas Banionis
Stage Designer – Sergėjus Bocullo
Costume Designer – Daiva Petrulytė
Composer – Faustas Latėnas
Assistant director – Inga Maškarina
Stage Director’s Assistant – Gelena Ivaškevič

Production Manager – Aleksandra Šalkinė
Translated from English into Russian and adapted by Olga Varshaver and Tatyana Tulchinsky
Translated from Russian into Lithuanian by Sigita Stanaitytė
Literary adaptation of the play in Lithuanian – Gytis Norvilas

In Madame Rubinstein, a production by theatre and film director Raimundas Banionis, based on the comedy by Australian playwright John Misto, audiences are taken behind the scenes of America’s mid-20^th-century beauty industry. Its central character is the historical figure Helena Rubinstein (1872–1965), a lioness of the cosmetics business.

Although Helena Rubinstein was a real historical figure, Misto did not write a biographical play; he merely drew on the facts of her life. Born Chaja into a Jewish family in Kraków, Helena Rubinstein – as she later came to call herself – became a millionaire in New York. She won worldwide renown through her flair for publicity, business acumen, tireless work and frugality, lived a remarkable life, and died at a ripe old age. The play is also set within a very specific time frame: 1954 to 1965, the final decade of the heroine’s life.

The comedy opens with an intriguing encounter: in unexpected circumstances, the elderly Madame Rubinstein meets an Irishman named Patrick, who later becomes her secretary, closest companion and friend. Here, the portrayal of the heroine’s sunset years is vivid, fluid and entirely convincing.

The production also aims to unveil the fates of two women – business rivals Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden. These were women who had sacrificed everything for their careers: family, and even the relationships with their children. They lived, created and immersed themselves in a business world with no place for comfort or support. To remain at the top, they had to remain extraordinarily resourceful, astute and strong – and utterly ruthless in dealing with others.

“This is a play about something deeply unfunny, and increasingly relevant – human loneliness. Only at the end of her life did Helena Rubinstein realise how alone she was, despite her longing for human warmth and having had two sons and three husbands. She captured the media’s attention, was painted by Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí, and moved among the famous; yet at the end of her long life, only Patrick – her disabled assistant, scarred by war – remained by her side. The playwright invites us to consider what it means to command a global business empire while sacrificing one’s personal life and human happiness.” (Raimundas Banionis)

“Helena Rubinstein is a truly fascinating character – so colourful, so multifaceted, and with such subtle humour! This combination offers the actor boundless creative possibilities.” (Inga Maškarina)

“Inga Maškarina is one of that five per cent of actors who, as director Alvis Hermanis puts in his book The Diary, are able to ‘become someone else’, while ‘the rest spend their whole lives playing themselves in given circumstances’. Without ever losing the integrity of the role, Inga Maškarina brings out the many facets of Helena Rubinstein’s personality, as well as her transformation – and does so in comic situations without reducing the character to a caricature.” (Ieva Tumanovičiūtė)

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John Misto (b. 1952) is an Australian playwright and screenwriter. He studied arts and law at the University of New South Wales and, before establishing himself as a playwright and successful television writer, worked as a lawyer. Misto has received awards from the Australian Writers’ Guild and the Australian Film Institute. He is a laureate of the Australia Remembers National Play Competition and the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards.

Raimundas Banionis (b. 1957) is a Lithuanian film, television and theatre director. In 1980, he graduated from the Institute of Cinematography in Moscow. He has directed documentaries, feature films for young audiences, an opera film and television series. Banionis has also staged drama productions in theatres across Lithuania. His productions of classic comedies are marked by theatrical flair, vividly drawn characters and remarkable dynamism.

Cast:
Helena Rubinstein – Inga Maškarina
Elizabeth Arden – Edita Gončarova / Aleksandra Metalnikova
Patrick O’Higgins – Aleksandr Kanajev

Photos by Telman Ragimov