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On October 23, 1920 "Azerbaijani poverty" newspaper reported that, the Free State Satir-Agit Theater was opened and on the 20th of December, 1920 the opening ceremony was held.
The refounded theater was set up on the basis of remains of the N.F.Baliyevs theater "Letuchaya mish" which collapsed in Tbilisi. This theater also consisted of the rest of the troupe of the "Momus" theater broke up by the revolutionary goverment. The board of directors consisted of the following: - V.Shveytser (Pessimist) - the manager of the literary department in the "Letuchaya mish" theater. He was from Baku, a famious Moscow journalist and literator, who was at the same time the director of the theater. - P.Oreshkov (Letuchaya mish) - the head of the administrative department. - N.Qorodetskaya (Momus) - the head of the literary department. - B.Voronov (Letuchaya mish) - the head of the art department. Consequently V.Shvetser became the absolute head of the theater, as he was the one who carried out almost the whole directory functions. V.Sakhnovski (Moscow theater), S.Voronov (MKhT artist), A.Arapov and P.Uzunov - painters (MKhT, Studio 1), E.Somorodov, S. Somorodova, P.Chichkanov ("Momus") were involved to the company for a short period of time.
The plays in Satir-Agit theater represented the witty editing which consisted of one act plays, folksongs, staged poems and songs, khoreographical compositions on the revolutionary theme and so on. This miniature theater, working for the workers and poverty existed till 1923 and it was called up to carry out the functions of political agitation.
By the resolution of the Baku city executive committee the Satir-Agit Theater was renamed and since the 29th of April it was called the Baku Workers Theater. On the 25th of october the renamed theater met its audience with the first performance of the play "A city in a ring" by S.Mynin (director D.G.Gutman, artist V.Ivanov).
Originally, the troupe consisted of actors from Odessa, Moscow, Irkutsk. Those were N.Snejina, N.Leshinskaya, L.Morozova, L.Litvinova, O.Lanskaya, A.Gorskiy, S.Taneyev, K.Lavretskiy, S.Klimov, N.Kolomenskiy, N.Sokolov, N.Rogojin and others. The repertoir poster of the theater was presented by the revolutionary pathetics of the soviet and foreign play-writing, - "Bear wedding" by A.Lunacharskiy, "Lake Lull" by A.Fayko, "Gadfly" by E.Voynich and others.
In 1924 a Studio of practical studies was established in Baku Workers Theater. Here the students were taught the skills of this profession by the "meyerhalds" (those who filled up the troupe) - V.Fyodorov, S.Moyorov (directors), M.Jarov (actor). The troupe was also filled up with such actors as F.Ranevskaya, V.Kuznetsov; artists S.Yefimenko and I.Shletenov.
The plays of young talanted directors and artists were not lost in the general background of the theater life of the new state. On the contrary, they differed by their variety of staging stylistics, meeting the demands of both the spirit of times and the creative individuality of each of them. The appearance of the creations by azerbaijani playwrites in the repertoir caused the increase of social status of the theater.
So, in 1937 the theater was renamed to Azerbaijan State Redflag Theater of russian drama.
Gradually, the theater became popular and one of the leading theaters in the structure of theater business. Thanks to the established tour practise, the theater began its trips from the neighbouring cities of the Northern Caucasus and Transcaucasia up to the whole territory of the Soviet Union.
Here you can see the scheme of the tours of RDT.
The names of some directors and actors became famous. Many of them were invited to take part in filming by leading movie studios.
The rising of the theater was closely connected with the creation activity of the directors who grew well-known in the history of the soviet theater. Those were: D.Gutman, E.Loyter, A.Ivanov, F.Fyodorov, S.Mayorov, E.Gakkel, A.Ridal, A.Tuganov, A.Gripich, Y.Yaroslavskiy, I.Idayatzade, K.Stepanov-Kolosov and others.
The particular bloom of the theater was associated with the student of GITIS (Moscow State Institute of Theater Arts) - M.K.Ashumov, who supplemented the repertoir with the high-quality stagings of russian, foreign and modern soviet plays. With this he revealed to the Baku spectators a great number of actor gifts (talents). Among them - V.Shirye, R.Ginzburgh, A.Falkovich, K.Adamov, M.Adushev, L.Gruber, P.Jarikov, A.Kornilov, M.Lezgishvili, A.Meshalkin, K.Myakishev, V.Otradinskiy, G.Sorin, P.Yudin, K.Babicheva, K.Irmich, Y.Kolesnichenko, A.Suvirova, N.Sarnatskaya and others.
The period of 60-80s is linked with the creation activities of such directors as G.Akhmedova-Martinova, D.Selimova, I.Khasin, E.Sakharov, E.Beybutov, E.Aliyev, R.Ibragimbekov. Also there appeared new names of very gifted actors in the troupe, like M.Yagizarov, T.Galakichiyeva, L.Dukhovnaya, D.Tumarkina, A.Sharovskiy, S.Mirzagasanov, L.Chesnakova, R.Amirbekova, N.Tagiyeva, M.Magerramov, A.Nikushina, Y.Baliyev, N.Baliyeva.
Many foreign, russian and national plays were staged there. The Russian Drama Theater named after S.Vurgun (1956) keeps being the popularizer of the dramatic creations of various ganre in russian.
The theater still has its spectator, the spectator has its favourite actors and directors. This relation weakened for some time during the post-soviet period. However, the theater studied the social structure of the new auditorium scrupulously, took into consideration its demands and socio-economic situation of the society. Then the repertoir poster of the theater was filled up with comedies by foreign, russian and azerbaijani playwriters, entertaining performances - stagings on the themes of the theater. In this way the theater found how to attract its spectator. These were the most popular ones: S.Moughem - "Circle", J.Poirot - "Family week-end", V.Neverov, A.Sharovskiy - "Mad day, or Scenes for deranged with a spectator", A.Miller - "View from the bridge", E.de Filippo - "Filumena Marturano", Elchin - "Hello, I'm your uncle", L.de Vega - "Cuning lover", G.Patric - "Ah, how to finish the old woman", V.Neverov - "Guesting at wild Rose and her friends", and many others.
Gradually, the spectator comes back to the theater, which responds to the auditorium and its interests, finds the forms of the differentiated approach to the creation of the repertoir. Taking into consideration the possibility of flow of the new russian-speaking spectator, the board of directors headed by the chief director, Azerbaijan people's artist A.Sharovskiy showed 6-8 plays per year, including tales for children.
But today the staff of the troupe has considerably changed, owing to the students of the Azerbaijan State Art and Culture University, Khoreographical school and Dramatic Studio of the theater. Concerning the quantity, the russian-speaking proffessional actors, actresses and artists are the majority. That's why, the theater is looking for new ways and opportunities for involving spectators and popularizing dramatic plays in russian.
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