[1] The theatre At Nikitsky (that's how it was known for a while) was built in 1886 by Konstantin Tersky specifically as a venue for famous foreign artists visiting Moscow.

In 1931-1942 Alexei Popov (1892-1961) was the Revolution Theater director; among the better known productions of this period were "Poem of an Axe", "My Friend", "Romeo and Juliet", "Death of a Squadron".

His major productions included "The Young Guard", "Mother", "Zykovs", "The Storm", "Hamlet, "The Bug", "Aristocrats", and "The Irkutsk Story".

This period's highlights were "Talents And Admirers", "Vanyushin’s Children", "The Defeat", "The Bankrupt", "A Streetcar Named Desire", "A Man from Lamanchi", "Talks With Socrates", "Seagull", "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk", "The Life of Klim Samgin", "Fruits of Enlightenment".

In the 2005 premier of "Dead Souls" (representing for the first times both parts of Gogol's classic) Artsybashev played Chichikov.