This is the English translation provided in the programme
Act 1
THE SETTING is a suburb of Moscow toward the end of the Cold War. Anatoly Sergievsky is preparing to leave for the West to play in the World Chess Championship. As the representative of the Soviet Union, he will be challenging the US world champion Freddie Trumper. After saying goodbye to his family, Anatoly is escorted by Molokov to the Moscow airport. Molokov and his KGB men are assigned to keep an eye on him every step of the way. During the endless security checks, and in the focus of surveillance cameras, Anatoly contemplates his life, and all his lost dreams.
WHEN ANATOLY ARRIVES in Merano, he finds a swarm of journalists waiting for Freddie Trumper. Celebrities abound on the red carpet leading to the television studio where the championship will be played and broadcast live. Freddie and his partner, Florence, arrive. Freddie insults Anatoly in public as the opponents are introduced. Florence does her best to gloss over the incident, but the tension between the Russians and the Americans is tangible. Molokov reminds Anatoly that not only his personal destiny is at stake but also that of the entire Soviet Union. This chess championship is a weapon in the ongoing Cold War, a matter of life or death in the struggle between East and West!
IN THE STUDIO, Florence tries to calm Freddie down, warning him that he must not be too provocative, because the whole world is watching. Freddie reminds Florence that she has every reason to hate the Russians, considering what happened to her family at their hands in Hungary in 1956. Florence remembers her father's arrest by Russian soldiers in Budapest when she was a child. These memories trigger strong emotions in her, and she begins to be ambivalent.
THE JUDGES INTRODUCE the competition. Anatoly and Freddie take their places, and the Championship can begin. With each move, Freddie shows increasing signs of being on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Realizing that he is losing, he abandons the game and the studio. Again, Florence tries to resolve the conflict. The judges issue a warning, and instruct Freddie Trumper to be back within 24 hours if he wants to go on with the Championship.
FLORENCE AND ANATOLY find themselves alone in the empty studio. They begin to converse, are mutually attracted, and suddenly they are in love. Anatoly embraces Florence and they run out of the studio under the noses of the KGB. Anatoly has decided to defect, and begins a desperate search for an embassy where he can apply for political asylum. Immediately, Molokov puts his KGB officers to work in both Merano and Moscow. While the officers in Merano hunt Anatoly down, their colleagues in Moscow arrest his family. By the time Anatoly arrives at the embassy the journalists are already there, hot for political scandal. Dazed, Anatoly and Florence begin to realize that their impulse may have incalculable consequences.
Act 2
ANATOLY AND FLORENCE return to their hotel in the middle of the night. Anatoly's wife Svetlana and the KGB officers await him in his room. Freddie awaits Florence in theirs; having read about the scandal in the tabloids, he is furious. They quarrel, and Freddie realizes that Florence is going to leave him. Broken-hearted, he seeks comfort in the hotel bar. Anatoly and Svetlana are also arguing. Molokov interrupts their discussion by having their son Misha brought in. This move is emotional blackmail to Anatoly, but he refuses to listen. Svetlana leaves the room indignantly and also heads for the bar to drown her sorrows. Meanwhile, Florence wanders the hotel corridors, unable to sleep and overwhelmed by feelings of both joy and doubt. She encounters both Freddie and Anatoly, and a confrontation ensues. Soon the whole hotel is awake, and the lobby is full of journalists. Anatoly and Florence run out together, while Freddie goes to see the judges, saying he is ready to continue playing the Championship. The judges announce that the broadcast will soon be resumed. Florence and Svetlana meet by coincidence, and both claim that they have no intention of giving up Anatoly. Molokov turns up to speak with Anatoly just a few minutes before the Championship is to resume. He demands that Anatoly lose the game, withdraw his asylum application and declare that he had been temporarily deranged. He will then be flown home to Moscow and committed to a mental hospital. There is no need for Molokov to explain what will happen to Anatoly's family if he refuses to cooperate.
DURING THE GAME, Anatoly is terribly distracted, imagining all kinds of things. This internal conflict has thrown his mind thoroughly off balance. Should he lose at chess, thus sacrificing both love and freedom, or win the game but lose his family and his nation?
MIRA BARTOV director
Below are basic translations of the Swedish notes from the programme.
A Sunny Day - Benny Andersson
A sunny day sometime in the early 80s Bjorn and I were in the Ulvaeus family home working on some music., when suddenly an unknown man crawled through an open window into the living room. He brushed himself down and said his name was Dean Young, son of Chic Young, creator of the cartoon character Blondie. He asked if we were interested in working with him to write a musical about Blondie and Dagobert. Hmm, we said, maybe.
We had for sometime talked about writing for the theatre, because we thought it was a great way for us to get on with our artistic ambitions. But even if it sounded a little fun to write something about a famous cartoon character, we felt a bit insecure to work with a gentleman who enters into a unknown house through a window, although he seemed sympathetic. Why did he not use the door, one can wonder?
However, what then happened was that same week (!) Popped up Tim Rice in Stockholm and said that he had heard that we were interested in writing musical theatre, could we imagine working with him? He had two ideas. One of King Solomon and another about chess! We thought about both of them and it seemed totally impossible to write a musical about chess, so we decided on the spot to do just that. We would just talk a little with Frida and Agnetha, that we would need to take a short break from ABBA, because this could take a year or two. They both thought it sounded like a good idea with a break. And that is it...
There has been many different versions of Chess around the world over the years, but I like best this version "in Swedish" which Lars Rudolfsson originally directed. And every time when I listen to it, I think we made the right decision back in the early 80's. I now look forward again to the new production at the Gothenburg Opera.
Chess & the Cold War - Björn Ulvaeus
When we started writing Chess in 1982 the Cold War between East and West was still a tangible reality and no one thought it would ever come to an end. In Sweden, we lived very close to the great threat from the East and it was partly because of this that we felt naturally attracted by Tim Rice's idea of a musical set within the chess environment. Ten years earlier, "the chess match of the century" played in Reykjavik between Bobby Fischer, the U.S., and Boris Spassky, the Soviet Union, was the one that had inspired him to create the short synopsis he presented to us.
Today, it is perhaps difficult to understand what it meant to escape the communist dictatorship in the East - the people who did, did so at the risk of their own life and without knowing what price those they left behind would have to pay. Tensions between East and West forms the backdrop to the love story in Chess.
It's been a long time now and many of you here tonight may not have any memories from that time. Since the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, the Cold War drifted into the mists of history and a whole new world emerged. But when we wrote Chess, the threat was constantly there, and the impossibility of a love between a woman from the West and a man from the East was a grim reality for many and for us an inspiration to the story we wanted to tell.
Chess and freewill - Director Mira Bartov
WHEITHER WE BELIEVE in a creator or not, we have the most beautiful and unwieldy gift mankind has received, our free will. All myths which are about our origins and our history begin with the nature of putting it to the test.
ONE OF THE MANY MYTHS about how chess came to be, tells of a Persian ruler who was sick of being a plaything of the gods and the random one's hands. He wanted something created that would entirely be controlled by man. So, we had chess, and it was a celebration of reason and free will. But man as reflecting individual has throughout history been a threat to the powers and even chess turned out to be a dangerous game, which was banned by many rulers through the ages. The step from understanding the choices available in an abstract world, to challenge the entire external system that our existence is based on, is not that large.
HUMAN EVOLUTION as a thinking being, has gradually led us to the realization that we can shape our own destiny. Governments has been overthrown and gods fallen. Today and in our part of the world is the freedom to choose, a fact we take for granted. But how do we use our freedom and are we really happier the more choice we have?
LET US PLAY WITH the idea that chess is a metaphor for a person's life. Each move is then an act, the consequences of how it all ends. Each piece represents someone or something, which plays a crucial role in our lives. Then add the number of combinations of chess moves which are said to be in parity with the number of atoms in the universe. A breathtaking view, which can have a paralyzing effect on the ability to act.
THERE IS NO COINCIDENCE in chess, no element of luck or bad luck, but it is justice, Divine Justice, which we can lack in reality, but exists in the chess world. How much we can gain is directly related to how much risk we are willing to take, and how much we are willing to invest. To win at chess requires sacrifice. How much are we willing to sacrifice our nature for what we really want in life? And what is it we really want out of it? For surely it is our choices in life, that defines who we are as people.
Chessmästaren - Astrid Pernille Hartmann
"Can you write music?" When Björn and Benny together with Tim Rice, created their first musical they needed ... Anders Eljas. He would be required to write the musical score for the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) who would play the new musical when recorded. Eljas had formerly been a keyboard player with ABBA on their world tours, he said yes, and arranged, orchestrated and conducted, the disc recording, concert tour and then the theatrical world premiere in London three years later in 1986. The Concert premiere with the LSO was probably the happiest day of my life, says Eljas. Since then he has followed this his "first musical child" through various versions and configurations in concert, on tour and on stage.
Having arranged for small and large orchestras, the Cothenburg Opera is a new arrangement and orchestrated thoroughly through dialogue and interaction with the musicians. Piano Player, Joakim Kallhed playing a chord to Eljas during a break: - How do you think it would sound with Minor here? And the minor becomes the center of the musical joy. - I have not been so happy since Mahler concert, says one of the blowers, Eljas has all music within him, so this must have been through working with Mozart. Another piece provokes musicians comment "that sounds a little Chopin". - It may be my old teacher at the Music Academy, Irene Mannheimer hovering over that chord, smiles Eljas, she studied with one of Chopin's pupils.
CHESS CONTAINS many different styles of music, pop, rock, with hints of something Chopin, Mozart, Debussy, Ravel etc. Eljas set the bar high from the start. - Bengt Hallberg, like Nelson Riddle, Frank Sinatra's main organizer, advised me to listen to Ravel and Debussy and one of the numbers in Chess is very inspired by Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe says Eljas, who also grew up with a lot of jazz. Her father had a large collection of jazz records and an early childhood memory is when his father taught him to play Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star with jazz harmonies, a little later he played Mozart's childhood variations on the same theme. Good melodies would always reappear in new variations, like the musical features of Chess.
Chess and Politics - Sthig Jonasson
Sthig Jonasson, cultural journalist and chess historian; has been on the Swedish Chess Federation Central Board for many years and has met with the greatest masters. Here he writes about chess and politics and some famous chess profiles.
Chess has often been used as a metaphor for various human activities, not least politics, and when Benny Andersson, Tim Rice and Bjorn Ulvaeus created the musical Chess, they took note of how the game of chess has affected high politics and about love across the Iron Curtain.
Throughout the 1900s, chess was influenced by various political events. At the start of the First World War in 1914 there was an international tournament in Bergheim, Germany. It was discontinued and the participating Russian players were interned including the future world champion Alexander Aljechin. It was some days before he left Germany and went on a long detour through several European countries home to Russia, the last bit via ferry from Stockholm - Abo and further home to Moscow.
Even at the outbreak of WWII in 1939 there was a large international tournament, this time the Chess Olympics in Argentina with twenty-seven participating countries. On September 1, it was discovered several of the countries were at war with each other. The England team immediately stopped the contest to return to England and in Buenos Aires they adopted the Solomon-like decision that matches between the remaining warring countries would end 2-2 without them being played.
It was a more direct attempt to politicize chess in 1942 when the Great Russian Chess Federation invited a number of European union, but not the British, to form a European Chess Federation (ESF) under Russian leadership. The Swedish Chess Federation, SSF chose to join but it led to such extensive protests among the Swedish chess players that SSF left ESF within a year.
The 1972 world title match between American Bobby Fischer and the Soviet world champion Boris Spassky had great media coverage and was blown up as a political showdown between East and West. Chess suddenly became the talked about sport and the game and its protagonist also inspired the authors of this evening's musical.
A bigger political surge did not happen. The hyped match was filmed in Iceland where Spassky lost the world title, for which Soviets had held the monopoly since 1948. The West ignored the possible propaganda value of Fischer's win and Fischer was too erratic and completely uninterested in being used as propaganda figure.
Bobby Fischer was a player who often stormed out for various reasons. In a match against Spassky, he walked out in the second half because his requirements that television cameras be removed from the playing hall had not been met. Today it is common for tournaments and matches to be broadcast live over the Internet. Whoever wants can connect and follow the parties in real time and get comments and features.
Fischer's background is interesting. His mother, talented, highly educated and politically active on the left side, was a restless soul and when Bobby was little moved often. They also lived in Europe, but eventually landed in Brooklyn where Bobby grew up. He was very lonely - the mother had two jobs to support herself and her son, who for many years did not know who his father was. As a young man, he broke with his mother and then focused entirely on chess.
Bobby Fischer was a man of principles. He refused to sell his name to sponsors, and he declined to appear in Las Vegas, although he was offered a large fee . He did not want to be a side-show at a boutique. At the board, he was true. It was with his game he would defeat the man on the other side of the board.
After his World Champion victory Fischer lost interest in chess. He stopped playing, joined a religious sect and began a reclusive life in Pasadena. His final years were spent in Iceland, where he died in 2008 and was buried there. An understanding of Fischer and his life may be found in the excellent television documentary Bobby Fischer Against The World, a title that also alludes to Fischer's paranoia which increased with age.
One recent colourful profile, a healthy mix of chess and politics, is the Russian player Carry Kasparov. After a very successful chess career, the hot-headed Carry left chess to devote himself entirely to criticising Putin policies at home. In 2010 he organized the political opposition campaign 'Putin must resign.' Kasparov has repeatedly been arrested for organizing and participating in demonstrations, as recently as when he was accused of biting a police officer in the hand, at a demonstration in connection with the trial of the punk group Pussy Riot. When it comes to the musical Chess whether it could claim some inspiration from the renegade Russian grandmaster Viktor Kortjnoj - the musical tells of such hysteria as his - is somewhat unclear. But he did actually play a controversial World Cup match in Merano in 1981, where the Musical's story unfolds.