Bulgakov classic to enthral Russia

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
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The streets are expected to be deserted tonight at 8.55 when millions switch on their televisions for the first Russian screen adaptation of a surreal 1930s novel that features a gun-slinging cat and the devil as a magician.

Until now, it was widely thought The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, considered a masterpiece of 20th-century storytelling, was impossible to adapt to film. But veteran director Vladimir Bortko has promised his eagerly awaited screen version will stick closely to the original text, admitting to reporters last week he had put his reputation on the line to interpret the book.

"It's not so much the mystical halo surrounding the novel but the spiritual responsibility in the face of Bulgakov's legacy," he said.

The novel is a biting satire written during Stalin's purges but suppressed in Russia until 1966. The story interweaves an account of the satanic conjurer Woland visiting Moscow with scenes from the Jerusalem of Pontius Pilate. Critics say it is at once a fantastical adventure, a fable of good versus evil, and a lampooning of Soviet absurdities.

Several famous quotes from the novel have entered the Russian lexicon. The Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev once taunted his enemies with the phrase "Annushka has already spilled the oil," meaning an unavoidable fate.

There have been other attempts to adapt the novel but no director has ever achieved a faithful rendition in the eyes of the public. A Polish version focused on the story's bible themes and a Yugoslav one changed essential characters.

After a Russian production filmed a decade ago was never shown,there were even rumours of a jinx.

Bortko's slick £2.8m adaptation had no such problems. It was funded by the state-controlled channel Rossiya and will run from today in 10 parts. Newspapers have predicted a quietness descending across the country for the first episode, not seen since viewers were glued to the seminal 1970s spy series, Seventeen Moments of Spring.

A privileged few who have seen clips from the new film "want only to put everything aside and sit in front of the television for 10, happy days", said Rossiiskaya Gazeta. However, the paper predicted lively criticism from the public, with almost every Russian "seeing the book as their own".

The Master and Margarita was filmed mostly in the former imperial capital, St Petersburg, where architecture more closely resembles Moscow before the second world war.

Special effects appear in two hours of the series. Begemot, a kind of malicious Puss in Boots, was brought to life in three different forms that are grafted together in the final cut: a computer-generated creature; a real, trained cat; and the actor Vano Miranyan in costume.

Despite the hype surrounding the film, Bulgakov fans are reserving judgment. "I'm curious to see how it's received," said one language tutor who studied the novel at university. "A lot of younger people are just not aware of the underlying themes of the novel."