Biography
Kirill Semyonovich Serebrennikov (Russian: Кирилл Семёнович Серебренников; born 7 September 1969 in Rostov-on-Don) is a Russian theatre and film director, as well as a theatre designer. Since 2012, he has served as the artistic director of Moscow's Gogol Center and is recognized as one of Russia's foremost theatre directors.
Born in Rostov-on-Don, Russian SFSR, to a Jewish father and Ukrainian mother, Serebrennikov graduated from Rostov State University in 1992 with a degree in physics. He had no formal theatre training before beginning his career as a stage director in 1994. He initially directed music videos and commercials, and in 2001, staged his first production in Moscow. His theatre work includes productions at the Moscow Chekhov Theatre, Latvian National Theatre, and Theatre of Nations. In opera, he has worked with the Mariinsky Theatre and Bolshoi Theatre in Russia, as well as Komische Oper Berlin and Stuttgart Opera in Germany, also contributing as a stage director and ballet designer. Serebrennikov is among the artistic directors of Moscow's Territory Festival and has been a professor at the Moscow Art Theatre School since 2008, teaching actors and directors. His films have been featured at major festivals such as Cannes, Locarno, Rome, and Warsaw, where his film Yuri's Day won the Grand Prix.
In 2012, he became the artistic director of the Gogol Center. On 23 May 2017, law enforcement raided his apartment and the Gogol Center over alleged embezzlement related to the Seventh Studio, a non-profit founded by Serebrennikov. Although no charges were initially filed against him, many prominent cultural figures viewed the raid as a political move aimed at discouraging criticism of the government. Serebrennikov had openly opposed the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea and supported Russia’s LGBT community. On 22 August 2017, he was detained by the Investigative Committee of Russia on suspicion of orchestrating fraud involving state subsidies received by the Seventh Studio from 2011 to 2014. In June 2020, he was convicted, fined, and given a suspended sentence in a ruling criticized by Human Rights Watch. Despite reportedly being under house arrest, Serebrennikov traveled to Hamburg in January 2022.
17 wins and 37 nominations
