According to Choporov, Bilous in his productions unjustifiably forced women to be naked and humiliated them.
“All the productions were built on sex, on the humiliation of women, on some kind of incomprehensible nudity of women. Unjustified,” said the actor who worked with Bilous.
According to the artist, he has been in the theater environment since he was 17 years old, so “certain things were a certain norm for him.”
“If you live with cannibals, it’s not surprising for you to eat human meat, because that’s how you grew up. We were brought up on this approach. For us it was the norm. It wasn’t something extraordinary,” admitted Choporov. “His methods of work are quite terrible. But in Kyiv theaters there are many people like Bilous. He’s not the only one. It’s always leading to hysteria. It’s some kind of psychological violence. It was always present. I remember he put a lot of pressure on the actress. I said: “That’s it, you don’t need to do this. The man is already crying.” – “Ilya, why the fuck are you doing this? I'm here to educate.”
The artist noted that “there were a thousand such moments.”
“The psychological abuse was constant. And that psychological abuse very often led to sexual abuse,” he said.
Choporov added that the psychological violence lasted for years and only then sexual violence was committed against the victim.
Context
January 27 2025 goals Bilous was suspended from teaching at the theater university. This happened after Bilous's former student Sophia Shoemaker accused him of sexual harassment. February 4 Bilous announced that he had filed a police report.
On February 10, the National Police opened criminal proceedings regarding unlawful actions on the part of Bilous. On the same day in KSCA stated that they would suspend Bilous from work at the Young Theater, where he works director and leader.
On May 8, the actors of the Young Theater, after finishing the play “Dangerous Liaisons,” addressed the audience with a statement. The actors said that about 80% of their colleagues in the theater suffered from Bilous's sexual harassment, and called on society not to remain silent about it.
On October 22, the Pechersky District Court of Kyiv granted the prosecutor’s request and chose a preventive measure for Bilous in the case of sexual violence against female students. Bilous was escorted out of the courtroom by a convoy.
Bilous argued that “nand did not cause any harm to a single girl.”
“Even during rehearsals, I have sex in the presence of everyone, because I stage performances that are quite frank and give quite frank tasks to my actors. Therefore, I deny any accusations of violence. I want to responsibly declare to you that there has never been any violence on my part towards anyone. And I have not caused any physical or moral harm to a single person,” he said. “No one has stated this anywhere before. And the fact that this happened in January, I believe, is a custom campaign against me, whose goal was to destroy me as the head of the most successful theater.”
In December, the Pechersky District Court of Kyiv extended the detention for two months. Bilous will be held until January 21, 2026, without bail.
