105 jubilee of drama theatre

The Nizhny Novgorod Drama Theater was opened on the eve of All-Russian Industrial and Art Exhibition. In fact, the first public theater in the city appeared in 1798 when Mr. Shakhovskoy, a local landowner, picked some of his most gifted serfs to form a company. The theater used to occupy the Bugrov house on the Verkhnebazarnaya Square.

A new building emerged before the exhibition. Chief Imperial Theater Architect V. Shreter gave it a traditional European theater style, which becomes fully evident from his original design, slightly modified in the process of construction.

The opening day coincided with Nicholas II crowning ceremony in Moscow, and the theater became known as the Nikolayevsky Theater, keeping the name until 1917. Fyodor Shalyapin, a then unknown opera singer who went on to become a world-renowned star, sang the leading part in Mikhail Glinka's Life for the Tsar opera during the opening ceremony.

By the materials of book "Anniversary Nizhny"