Kamenev
I am writing to you because
I was beaten in the SNK over this matter—and I had, in the SNK, committed myself to the cause of education—but
I am
not at all convinced that, in the Nikitsky Theatre, despite my warnings,
Lunacharsky has shown an unacceptable degree of vacillation and instability, and I fully sympathize with
Evelinov’s plight
and with L. K.
as a “lesson” for Lunacharsky—or perhaps as a “lesson” directed at him personally.
Upon returning from yesterday’s session of the Moscow City Council, I received the following official communication:
Having ordered the Nikitsky Theatre to be reopened, Lunacharsky summoned Evelinov to his office and said to him: “If Kamenev tries to interfere with you through his petty schemes, feel free to call me even at 3 a.m.”
Evelinov related this in the presence of an official representative of the Moscow Soviet, who later conveyed the account to me. Is that clear?
On December 29, 1919, by decision of the Small Sovnarkom, the Nikitsky Operetta Theatre was closed. The grounds for closure were purely entrepreneurial in nature.
On January 20, 1920, the Great Sovnarkom upheld the decision of the Small SNK and the directive of the Central Theatre to transfer the theatre’s assets to temporary administrators; however, the People’s Commissar for Education was granted the authority to reopen the theatre—as soon as its financial affairs were brought into order and the theatre’s repertoire was placed under strict oversight.
In January 1920, the Small Sovnarkom heard the request of the local artists’ committee to be permitted to continue operating temporarily—and rejected it.
The People’s Commissar for Education, A. V. Lunacharsky, issued an order to reopen the theatre, given the dire circumstances faced by the theatre’s workers.
On January 23, 1920, he addressed a letter to the Moscow Soviet, requesting that the Moscow City Council henceforth assume responsibility for determining the fate of the theatre. A few days later, Lunacharsky sent another letter to the Art Department of the Moscow Soviet, asking that the former director, B. E. Evelinov, along with those closely associated with him, be removed from all involvement in the Nikitsky Theatre. In February 1920, in a letter to Lenin, Lunacharsky informed him that he was sending him the minutes of the meeting held by the theatre’s new leadership.