Moscow Art Theater

Moscow Art Theater Russian repertory company founded in 1897 by Constantin Stanislavsky and Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko . Its work created new concepts of theatrical production and marked the beginning of modern theater. Rebelling against the highly stylized theater of the 19th cent., the founders set out to create instead a true ensemble theater based on a realistic method of acting and production. Their productions of Chekhov 's plays, especially suitable to the company's subtle and intense style, brought fame to both Chekhov and the theater. Other memorable productions were Tolstoy's Czar Fyodor Ivanovitch, Dostoyevsky's Brothers Karamazov, and Gorky's Lower Depths. The company made several successful tours of the United States. It has continued its classic repertoire while reflecting in new productions the political changes within Russia over the years.

Bibliography: See N. M. Gorchakov, Stanislavksy Directs (1954); N. Houghton, Moscow Rehearsals (1962) and Return Engagement (1962); O. M. Sayler, Inside the Moscow Art Theatre (1925, repr. 1970); P. A. Markov, The Soviet Theatre (1978).

Moscow Art Theatre Russian theatre, famous for its contribution to naturalistic theatre. It was founded in 1898 by Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko. The original company consisted of amateur actors from the Society of Art and Literature, who were committed to adopting a more rigorous and professional approach to staging and acting. It was at the Moscow Art Theatre that Stanislavsky developed his influential method principle.

Moscow Art Theatre, famous theatre, now dedicated to Maxim Gorky, founded by Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko in 1898. It soon gave a successful production of Chekhov's The Seagull, which had recently failed at another theatre. It was followed by Uncle Vanya (1899), Three Sisters (1901), and The Cherry Orchard (1904). The repertory of pre-Revolutionary plays included a number of European classics, but the only play by Shakespeare to be performed was Julius Caesar. During the upheavals of the Revolution the theatre was saved from extinction by the efforts of Lunacharsky, and after a long tour of Europe and America in 1922 and 1923 the company returned to Moscow. Some tentative productions of new plays followed, including Bulgakov's The Days of the Turbins (1926), and the theatre finally found its feet in the new world in 1927 with the production of Ivanov's Armoured Train 14–69. The theatre was now firmly established, many actors, among them Kachalov, Moskvin, and Chekhov's widow Olga Knipper, spending the rest of their lives with the company, and being succeeded by actors trained in the theatre's own dramatic school. From this school developed also several important individual groups, among them those at the Realistic and Vakhtangov theatres. The Moscow Art Theatre visited London in 1958, 1964, 1970, and 1989, its productions of plays by Chekhov being of particular interest. In 1971 the artistic directorship of the theatre was assumed by Oleg Efremov, and two years later the company moved into new premises on the Tverskoy Boulevard, with a large auditorium seating nearly 1,400. The company also retained its old premises, which, with the dramatic school, gave it three bases from which to work. Because of its status as a showcase theatre, the Moscow Art Theatre is particularly prone to bureaucratic control, leading to ossification and overmanning. Efremov's attempts at reform partly succeeded when in 1985 the government divided the theatre into two companies sharing the same name but with different artistic policies.