Inostranka in Tbilisi

Masha Mashkova starring in the play "INOSTRANKA" based on Sergei Dovlatov's novel.

INOSTRANKA is a contemporary production directed by Maxim Didenko and starring internationally acclaimed actress Masha Mashkova. Based on Sergei Dovlatov's celebrated novella, it follows Marusya Tatarovich, a woman who leaves her homeland for America only to find herself longing to return — a story that Mashkova, a fourth-generation actress, interweaves with her own life in emigration: her attempts to break through in Hollywood, her years in Los Angeles, and her memories of family and growing up.

Staged without a fourth wall, the piece is a direct, unguarded conversation with the audience — ironic, honest, funny and quietly therapeutic. Didenko's signature method fuses live theatre, cinema and multimedia into a single stage language, with film becoming a full participant in the action. Beyond one woman's story, INOSTRANKA explores the broader and urgent themes of emigration, memory, identity and belonging — the universal experience of becoming a "foreigner" in a new country, a new profession, or even in one's own life, and of holding on to one's sense of humour when everything familiar falls away.

Actors appearing in INOSTRANKA: Maxim Sukhanov, Varya Shmykova, Nikita Kukushkin, and Nikola Ashurkov.

Creative team:

Playwright — Mikhail Durnenkov

Director — Maxim Didenko

Composer — Anna Drubich

Costume Designer — Tatyana Dolmatovskaya

Set Designer — Ksenia Peretrukhina

Choreographer — Vladimir Varnava

Lighting and Sound Design — Yury Galkin

Multimedia — Oleg Mikhailov

Producers — Aleksandrina Markvo, Katerina Kashintseva, Masha Mashkova