Mikhail Ugarov and Yelina Gremina, husband and wife, created the only independent documentary theater company in Moscow. Teatr.doc took on contemporary Russia and its most acute issues with anthropological rigor. Every performance gave clear evidence, hard proof of injustice.
There is a sort of bitter irony in the narrative that developed about the couple’s passing, as people on the other side of the world tried to fit them into a narrative of mysterious deaths that might be linked to vindictive conspiracies by the Kremlin. But that simply was not the case. The couple’s love for the theater and for each other was bigger than life, and they died within less than two months of each other, not least, because their hearts were broken.