The 42-year-old former dancer, now the Bolshoi Theater’s artistic director, was attacked near midnight on Friday as he left his car outside his home in central Moscow. The masked assailant then fled the scene.
The artistic director of the legendary Russian theater suffered severe burns of multiple degrees to his face and eyes, and is being treated at a hospital in Moscow where doctors are working to save his eyesight.
Filin is “in a satisfactory condition, in our burns center, not intensive care,” a hospital spokesperson said. Medics also suggested that Filin will need plastic surgery, and said the acid had affected his hair, which will start falling out soon, forcing him to wear a wig.
“The most threatening thing is that he has third-degree cornea burns which put his eyesight in danger,” medics explained. However, it will not be known for two weeks whether Filin will be able to keep his vision, Moskovsky Komosomolets newspaper reported citing the doctors.
The theater’s supervisory board said it decided to send Filin to a foreign clinic for treatment, indicating Germany and Israel as the two main options, Interfax news agency reported.
It will take Filin at least six months to recover, Bolshoi spokesperson Ekaterina Novikova said. She added that Sergey Filin had received threats from anonymous callers before. “We never imagined that a war for roles – not for real estate or for oil – could reach this level of crime,” Novikova said to Channel One. » | Friday, January 18, 2013
