A. V. EFROS AND THEATRE AT THE TURN OF THE 1930 - 1940s: EARLY THEATRE IMPRESSIONS
The article provides a reconstruction of Anatoliy Efros (soon an outstanding Soviet director) youth and the preconditions for his initial interest in theatre. In his young years he was not connected with the art sphere. The testimonies of his relatives and few memories of Efros himself about his childhood and youth help to define that he was attracted to theatre not as a viewer of the performances but after reading books about theatre and listening to radio rogramms. It seems the most important fact that he was interested in books about E. B. Vakhtangov. He became a reference figure for Efros as an innovator and creator of his own theatre. Efros viewer's tastes formation is considered in the context of the theatre Moscow of 30-40s. It is highlighted a very common for that time tendency to limit the opportunities for the director's free art. Their functions in the late Stalin era were transferred to the great actors. That fact explains Efros memories about outstanding Soviet actors (these are his youth theatre memories, kept in his articles, books and oral stories). Their stage roles and work stayed in his memory for his whole life. His impressions about I. M. Moskvin, V. I. Kachalov, N. P. Khmelev and all the actors of the Moscow Art Theatre further determined the peculiarities of his own acting school. Efros memories are chosen and arranged for the first time as a holistic system of the stage preferences and desires of the future director. The whole reconstruction is made on the basis of selection the critic reviews of the same theatre events in the Soviet press.