FACE AND VOICE OF FREEDOM

Today it is hard to imagine it, but 100 years ago a woman could not even think of going onstage in the theatre. Not only women, but also the theatre was treated by many with great suspicion, while radical young people often disrupted performances they did not like. Many playwrights had to work with an eye on the dominant morality, even if they did not agree with it. However, there were those who, on the contrary, defied it. And Cafar Cabbarli, seeing the change of the era, created the play "Sevil", dedicated to the transformation of a backward, submissive woman into a courageous and independent one. And the first to play this role was unforgettable Marziya Davudova, a truly heroic person of her time.

Hailing from Astrakhan

At the beginning of the century there was only one theatre in Baku, which could be called professional in one way or another. It was called "The Baku Theatre" and was created by Hasan bay Zardabi. In this theatre, women's roles were played by men for many years, as Muslim women did not venture to become actresses. And men who played female roles had hard times.

Nevertheless, there were enthusiasts who invited actresses from Russia. Most of them left the city after the tour. Learning roles in the Azerbaijani language and playing performances by Azerbaijani authors was out of the question. And the only theatre actress who agreed to do it was a 19-year-old Tatar actress from Astrakhan, Marziya Davudova.

In 1920, she arrived in Baku and settled here, marrying one of the leading theatre actors, the famous playwright and director Abbas Mirza Sarifzada. She had to play a lot of female roles, aristocratic ladies and simpletons, the main and supporting characters. There was a shortage of women. But her tenacity and willingness to work helped to overcome all obstacles. She learned Azerbaijani (which she picked up while living in Astrakhan) and spoke without an accent by the middle of the 1920s.

In fact, she was the first to play the roles that have now become classical on the stage of the theatre: in the works of Cafar Cabbarli - Gultakin ("Aydin"), Firangiz ("Oqtay Eloglu"), Solmaz ("Bride of Fire"), Yaxsi ("Almas"); Huseyn Cavid - Xumar ("Sheikh Sanan"); Samad Vurgun - Qizyeter ("Xanlar"); Mammadxanli - Gulzar ("The Morning of the East"); Mirza Ibrahimov - Hayat ("Hayat"), as well as in the works of foreign classics - the royal daughter Blanca in the play "The Royal Barber" by A. Lunacharskiy; Shakespeare - Macbeth ("Macbeth") and Desdemona ("Othello"); Ostrovskiy - Kabanikha ("Thunderstorm") and Kruchinina - "Guilty Without Guilt"; Maxim Gorky - Vassa Zheleznova ("Vassa Zhelez-nova"), Lyubov Yarovaya ("Lyubov Yarovaya").

Nobody but Marziya

Marziya Davudova was not only an industrious and beautiful actress, but also a talented teacher. It was she herself, while still young, who nurtured the first Azerbaijani actress Aziza Yusifzada (Mammadova), who appeared onstage in March 1923 and performed her own role in one of the early works of Cabbarli.

Few people know it today, but the work of sculptor Faiq Abdurahmanov "Liberated Woman" is largely associated with an incident that occurred in 1928, i.e. 42 years before the installation of the famous monument. The thing is that Soviet propaganda to eradicate veiling, which began in the 1920s, worked very badly because of its straightforwardness and obtrusiveness. Compulsory veiling was replaced with an obtrusive norm of anti-religiousness. It also met with hostility.

There was a need for an honest and truthful approach to the issue of women's equality. It was then that Cabbarli's famous play "Sevil" appeared. In the "Baku Theatre" at the time, and it was already 1928 when it became known as "Azdrama", there were already several actresses (almost all of them were beginners, amateurs). But none of the actresses dared to play in such a provocative performance - nobody but Marziya.

Bakinskiy Rabochiy newspaper dated 30 September of that year noted how many women attended this performance. But it was not the most important thing - many of them left the veil directly in their seats. It was precisely these episodes that inspired Abdurahmanov to create the famous sculpture.

Marziya Davudova lived a short life. 46 of the 60 years were dedicated to acting. During this time she managed to play in eight films, and the most famous of them are "The Lights of Baku", "Favourite Song" and "Koroglu". She nurtured a whole galaxy of actresses, including her daughter, famous Firangiz Sarifova. She was born from the marriage of Davudova and Sarifzada. Eight years after their divorce, Sarifzada was arrested and executed. The actress recalls that many in those terrible thirties told her that if she was married to Abbas Mirza, she and her daughter would have got dozen or so years in a prison camp.

But fate decreed otherwise. Abbas Mirza himself filed for divorce, and in 1930 she married a young actor Ulvi Racab. He was just two years younger than her, but was already well-known for his magnificent performance as Hamlet. It seemed that fate was favourable to Davudova and allowed her to save her life and survive the famine and disease of the war.

Marziya Davudova passed away at the age of 60, doing, perhaps, the most important thing that many great actors (and especially actresses) are not capable of - she left the stage in time, giving way to the young. She devoted the last 10 years of her life to theatre pedagogy, educating a new generation of actresses, as she did in the distant 1920s. In November, Azerbaijan celebrated 113 years since the birth of the legendary singer.