University Daily Kansan / Thursday, March 23. 1989
Lifestyle
9
East meets West
Pop culture, Soviet style, finds U.S. audience
Story by Brett Brenner Illustration by Dave Eames
Imagine yourself venging on the couch, touching blankly at head-banging music videos. The latest smut-madden novel lies next to your feet on the coffee table, on top of tickets to tomorrow's Billy Joe concert.
You grow bored and saunter to the window, gazing out at the skyline of . . . Kansas City? Boston? New York?
Try Moscow.
Experts agree that glasnost, or openness, in the Soviet Union has led to quantum growth of a once underground popular culture. What is less well known is that delegates from the United States are beginning to migrate west.
From New York to Kansas City, and even Lawrence, traces of Soviet popular culture are turning up every day, said Richard Sites, a professor of history at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and author of a forthcoming book on the topic.
Recent immigrants range from films to literature, including "The Children of Arbat," a book by Anatoli Rybakov that will be available in paperback in Lawrence books in May, and the movie "Repentance," which can be rented here on videocassette.
Movies are big on the culture scene in the Soviet Union and are also one of the most available mediums in the West.
The Tivoli Theatre in Kansas City, Mo., specializes in foreign films. The theater recently has run a series of films from the Soviet Union.
Last-se semester, Student Union Activities sponsored a Soviet film series that included the movie "Raspunt." The movie was filmed in 1975 but was shelved by Soviet censors until 1985 because of its sexual innocuences and political themes.
The Soviet people, instead of watching the avant-garde films, want to watch movies that make them laugh, Sites said. Charlie Chaplin films are popular, as are "Ombys in Moees" films.
So is a film called "The Bear's Wedding." The plot involves a vampire bear that stalks the dark halls of a Lithuanian castle.
Bill Vaill. Providence, R.I., graduate student, said that movies were a popular pastime in the Soviet Union for all ages. He said he had been to the Soviet Union several times, the most recent being last fall
"In the past, Soviet movies were boring, but now they are more interesting. They have started to social issues. Sex is showing up also."
Sex, along with suspense, is also a popular subject of Soviet literature, some of which has made the voyage to the West.
"The Children of the Arbat," a book by Anatoli Rybakov, has
received wide distribution in the United States. It will be released in paperback in May, said Bridget Crower, 380 Massachusetts St.,
"It is junk," Stites said of the book. "Trash."
He said that some of the most popular books in the Soviet Union were about the imperial courts of the tsars. The stories of sex and corruption in the monarchies scandalous to the Soviet public.
Falling in love isn't that shocking in the Soviet Union, but when the author described the two undressing each other and sleeping together, he pushed the outer limits of decency, Stites said.
Another book, "Hologram," by an author named Nikon, shook the public with its story of two young people falling deeply in love.
"The intelligencia was outraged, but the people loved it," Stites said. Other novels are rife with James Bond-style espionage
The portrayal of U.S. citizens in these novels is much the same as the portrayal of Soviets by U.S. novelists.
"The Americans are always pasty and slightly effeminate," said Stites.
In the world of fashion and fads, Soviets take their cues from the West. Viall said.
He said that the hot items were Reebok, clothes from L.L. Bean and all-leather boots. The boots are made of leather and have a symbol of the United States, he said.
"They have their own styles, also," he said. But, "the Western-
leaning youth for the most part want American goods."
Viall said that two years ago in Lenningird it was fashionable for women to paint their eyelids to those in Egyptian hieroglyphs.
He also said that the black market was thriving and that the black marketeers knew what they wanted.
"You could show them a pair of Sporto duck shoes and they would say, 'I want L.L. Bean duck shoes.' " Viall said.
A new wave of Soviet music is sweeping the country. The bands have yet to catch on outside the Soviet Union, but Sites says that he can see the day when they will tour the United States.
Sites said that the most popular female performer may be a Madonna-esque singer named Puga. He compares her to Bette Midler.
"She is what they call a 'scandalista,'" he said. "She causes problems."
Besides singing about lost loves, she wears Western clothing and is outspoken. She has been known to demand that foreign tourists vacate a hotel room so that she, "a loyal Soviet citizen," can stay there.
Two groups more recently on the Soviet music scene are Bravo and Alisa
Alisa is considered to be a rock group, in a uniquely Soviet style.
Bravo sounds like a U.S. group from the 1950s. It is popular, Stites said, mainly because of its tremendous energy. *
Its heavy pop - almost hard rock
— sound in the song "Doctor Boogie" is extremely popular. Sites said he believed the group's popularity of pop music, such as Brave's,
Viall said that until about three years ago, rock music was outlawed in the Soviet Union.
"There were underground groups," he said. "it (rock) is replacing the pop garbage stuff that sounds like a cross between Lionel and Gap." The big influences for rock have been the Beatles and (Bob) Dylan.
Julie Hill, Springfield. Mo., graduate student, said that she was surprised by the extent to which popular music was allowed in the Soviet Union during her stay in the summer of 1987.
"I was impressed by the music videos that were on television," Hill said. "There weren't nearly as many as MTV, but there were some. I wasn't expecting to hear rock on the radio either."
Sites said that although popular culture was growing, there was tremendous opposition to the movement, especially the new music.
"The movement has been called 'musical alcoholism' and a 'creature of the CIA' by its critics," he said.
Yet, even with those obstacles, Stites said he believes that the cultural isolation of the Soviet Union may be coming to an end.
Viall agrees with Stites
Villait agrees with Stets."
"If it keeps going in the liberal era, it is now, it may become as permissive as ours," Viall said.