On 5th November 1909, the Russkiye Vedomosti newspaper published an announcement: "In the next couple of days, the Khudozhestvenny Electrotheatre will be opened, in a specially constructed building in Arbatskaya Square. Its auditorium seats 400 people and the lobby has a luminous fountain."
On 11th November 1909, the first show took place in the Khudozhestvenny Cinema (the Cinema, for short). The programme: Georgette, a drama performed by first-class Paris actors; The Angel of Reconciliation as well as other landscape and commercial films.
In 1911, in order to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Napoleon's defeat after his invasion into Russia (known as the 1812 Patriotic War in Russia), the Cinema was redesigned by the architect Franz Schechtel in the Empire style, which was in fashion at that time. Right after it had been opened, the Khudozhestvenny Cinema (then still known as "electrotheatre") became a favourite place of the Moscow aristocrats and intellectuals.
In 1924, the Cinema hosted the premier show of the film The Battleship Potyomkin, in 1931 it organised the premier show of the first Soviet sound film The Road to Life, in 1936 it hosted the premier show of the first Soviet colour film Grunya Kornakova.
At the Cinema, films by Mikhail Romm, the Vasilyev brothers and Grigory Aleksandrov started their life on screen.
In the Soviet times, the Cinema was also a popular place for intellectuals of the country.
The Cinema has preserved a loge that was used by members of the country's political elite such as Joseph Stalin; Lavrenty Beriya, Stalin's chief of the KGB (then known as the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs); Anastas Mikoyan, the great politician of the Khrushchev era; Vyacheslav Molotov, Stalin's minister of foreign affairs, Nikita Khrushchev, and Yekaterina Furtseva, Brezhnev's minister of culture.
Despite multiple redesigns, the facade and the Grand Auditorium of the Cinema have preserved their original appearance (the Empire style). The Grand Auditorium has preserved moulding by Schechtel.
The Grand Auditorium.
The auditorium seats 609 people. Comfortable, modern chairs; the distance between rows — 1.20 metres (4 feet). The auditorium is equipped with an air-conditioning system; the Dolby Digital Surround EX sound equipment, the Kinoton projection equipment, a wide screen.
The Small Auditorium.
The cosy Small Auditorium seats 50 people. The auditorium is equipped with an air-conditioning system; the Dolby Digital Surround EX sound equipment, the Kinoton projection equipment.
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The Cinema looks really not so bad from the outside. There are no bright, blinking si...
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