Director Natasha Ramer

Natasha O. Ramer ~ Artistic Director

Natasha O. Ramer earned her Masters of Fine Arts at the Russian Academy of the Performing Arts (GITIS) in Moscow, where she studied with the renowned actress and director Maria Knebel from Moscow Arts Theater, and later with Anatoly Efros and Yuri Liubimov. She directed plays throughout Russia and Lithuania and was Artistic Director of Lithuania’s Siauliai Drama Theater.

Since coming to New Orleans, Ramer has brought numerous theatrical productions, concerts, poetry readings, lectures, and festivals to the area to foster an awareness and celebration of Russian and Eastern European Culture. In 1999, she established Moscow Nights Inc., which is dedicated to preserving Russian and Eastern European Culture in Louisiana. She continues to serve as the artistic director of Moscow Nights and is a driving force behind The Russian Winter Festival, which takes place every other year. It has become a favorite among New Orleans festival goers.

Ramer’s directing record in the United States includes

·       The Water Nymph by Alexander Pushkin

·       The Shadow by Evgeny Shvarts

·       Hunting Cockroaches by Janusz Glowacki

·       The Paper Gramophone by Alexander Chervinsky

·       The Inspector General by Nikolai Gogol

·       The Marriage Proposal and The Bear by Anton Chekhov.

Ramer is also an actress and cabaret singer. Her cabaret show, Natasha O. Ramer – Twenty Years in America, took place at New Orleans’ Le Chat Noir in 2003. In 2004, she presented this cabaret and a special program of poetry and songs at the National Actors’ Club in Moscow. There she also appeared on Central Moscow television in an interview and concert on The Poetry Theater with Roman Viktiuk, which was broadcast in Russia, Europe, Israel, and the United States.

Natasha was recently invited to direct a play at the Lithuania’s Siauliai Drama Theater on the occasion of the theater’s 80^th anniversary.

Music Score

The musical score for the play includes excerpts from: Sergei Rachmaninoff’s 2^nd Piano Concerto, Peter Tchaikovsky’s Symphony N^o 6, Souvenir de Florence and Serenade in C Major, and Faina Lushtak’s Prelude.

The Russian song “Dark Eyes” is performed by Fyodor Chaliapin with a gypsy chorus.

Tchaikovsky’s “Romance” is performed on piano by Faina Lushtak.

The German rendering of the same “Romance” is sung by Zarah Leander.

The musical arrangement of the well-known Russian gypsy romance “Don’t Go Away, O My Golubchik” is by Faina Lushtak, with translation by Alexandra Raskina.

Consultants