Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s New Year's and Christmas televised address were filmed in the Holy Dormition of the Kyiv Cave Monastery and its main church, the Cathedral of the Assumption.
In his New Year's greeting, Yanukovych congratulated the Ukrainian people and outlined ways of future development, the press service of the President informed UNIAN. According to the chief director of filming, Anna Hres, it was not accidental the monastery was used to film the greeting to the Ukrainian people for the second time. “It is a very symbolic place for Ukraine. We want to convey the coziness and warmth of the New Year,” she said. According to her, the set design and script as a whole were in the tradition of the New Year greeting. However, said Hres, the crew attempted to find a new approach in its directing. “Every year we change, we try to improve,” she said.
Speaking about the design of the Christmas tree on the set, designer Maryna Yudina noted that the film crew tried to use the traditional colors. “Blue and yellow are the colors of the flag of Ukraine,” she said, and added that the blue color was used in ornaments and garlands, and yellow was used for the decorative bows. She also said that the height of this year's Christmas tree is 8 meters. About 2 km of garlands and dozens of large ornaments were used to decorate it. Overall, according to the designer, the process of preparing the Christmas tree for the shooting took about three days.
The people’s address to the Ukrainian president will air on Hromadske.tv on New Year's Eve at 11:55 p.m. Over 50 Ukrainians took part the recording of the collective “speech.” The address was filmed in Kyiv on December 27.
The organizers of this address believe that since Yanukovych virtually hasn’t spoken to his people in the last 5-6 weeks, on New Year's Eve he will also not have much to say to the Ukrainians.