The Saint Petersburg State Molodyozhny Theatre on Fontanka
The Saint Petersburg State Molodozhny, or “young persons'” Theatre on the Fontanka river finds its home in the ancient Izmailovsky garden, the history of which dates from the 18th century.
In the 1890s the garden was home to the country Stage; a wind orchestra performed here, along with tight rope walkers, jugglers, and gymnasts.
And in 1901 the merchant P.V.Tumpakov renovated the garden and erected a stone theatre. This corner of the city had long been nicknamed “Buff” (“Comic”). The new theatre staged operettas and concerts, on the programs of which performed local and visiting celebrities. The Izmailovsky garden did not betray its theatrical roots even during the war.
In 1979 the Molodyozhny Theatre was born here, founded by its director Vladimir Afanasyevich Malyshchitski, who headed the team until September 1983. In the company, alongside professionals performed the amateur actors of the Studia Theatre, in affiliation with the L.I.E.R.T (Leningrad Institute of Engineering and Railway Transport). The debut season opened on the 18th January1980 with a production of B. Goller's play 100 Bestuzhev Brothers. The theatre became an island of spirituality, drawing in the finest representatives of creative intelligentsia.
From 1983 to 1989 the chief director of the Molodyozhny Theatre was Efim Mikhailovich Padve, a lover of Theatre, its romance and performance art. His staging of the Vampilov play, Duck Hunting, was one of the best Leningrad productions of the 80s, and the concert-style production Music Played in the Garden, which had the nostalgia of the Stage at the beginning of the century, became an account of the history of the Molodyozhny Theatre and its actors.
In October 1999 the theatre became headed by one of the most gifted, “magical” directors of the city on the Neva, Semyon Yakovlevich Spivak. The theatre company was reinforced by his theatrical comrades-in-arms from the dramatic ensemble Molodoy Theatre (“Young Theatre”). The work and performances of this collective included Dear Elena Sergeevnaya, Blow, and Tango. With the production of Moliere's Bourgeois Gentleman, the modern history of the theatre on the Fontanka was beginning to take shape.
The stage of the Molodyozhny Theatre is home to “faces with uncommon expression”. The city is scattered with its characters on the streets; in houses; on every corner. They can be met in the silence of the computerised libraries, or in the galleries of the Mariinsky Theatre. Twisted in ivy, the building of the Molodyozhny attracts people, as if it were a “dark blue trolleybus”...
The theatre of Semyon Spivak is popular in its aesthetics, in the highest sense of the word. The spectators and artists change with generations, but they are all united in a world which prides itself on giving liberally to its audience; the world of the Molodyozhny Theatre.
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