In 1833, in the building erected by the architect A. P. Bryullov (the fagade was designed by C. Rossi), a theatre was opened where French and Italian actors staged musical comedies and vaudevilles for an exclusive aristocratic set.
A new creative life began at the theatre in 1918, when a new kind of theatre-goer heard the immortal music of Rossini at a performance of his opera The Barber of Seville. Since then the Maly Theatre has travelled a glorious path and has won the right to be called the ‘laboratory of Russianopera’. The landmarks in the work of the theatre are its new operas And Quiet Flows the Don and Soil Upturned by the composer I. I. Dzerzhinsky, War and Peace by S. S. Prokofyev, The Young Guard by J. S. Meitus and others. The names of the conductors S. A. Samosud, B. E. Haikin, the producer N. V. Smolitch, the artist V. V. Dmitriev and the singers P. M. Zhuravlenko and M. A. Rostovtzev are connected with the history of the creative activities of the theatre.
