Whose Tchaikovsky? Consumerism, nationality, sex and the curious case of the disappearing composer in Tchaikovsky and The Music Lovers

Abstract

This article offers the first sustained analysis of two films about the life of the composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky made in 1969 and 1970 respectively. One of these, Ken Russell’s The Music Lovers (1970), is well known in the West. The other, Tchaikovsky (1969) by Igor Talankin, is much less famous. The films were made across the divide of the Cold War, and though it might be tempting to see these biopics as mirror-images of one another, rival products of different political and social cultures, this article tempers such a reading in order to explore some unintended but nevertheless suggestive parallels between the two. Exploring both through their treatment of consumerism, nationality (specifically Russianness) and sexuality, the article argues that for different reasons and in slightly different ways, they offer a significant case study in how “problematic” aspects of a composer’s life can be obscured to the point where they disappear. This in turn makes the films an important point of reference for how “otherness”—particularly national and sexual “otherness”—has historically been handled by the big screen.

Keywords

• Tchaikovsky
• classical music
• biopic
• Igor Talankin
• Ken Russell
• consumerism
• nationality
• Russianness
• homosexuality